Ninjago Online: Progressive
by Packerfan95
Summary: Thousands of players have become trapped in the virtual world of Ninjago Online from the corrupt virus as the Overlord Virus. But before the fall of the virus out of the game, five lone players each embarked on their own adventure before becoming the powerful, surviving guild that destroyed the virus for good. Each of them had their own tale, faced their own trials, for survival.
1. The Invitation

**Hello everyone, Packerfan95 here with a new SAO story. Now this story is part of the first story I did. However, it contains five stories from each ninja in their own adventures before forming their guild to defeat the Overlord Virus. And up first is Kai, the samurai player. I hope you enjoy Ninjago Online: Progressive.**

* * *

 **Kai**

 **Chapter 1: The Invitation**

It's been a month since the tragic fate for thousands of people. And by people, it meant video game players. Thousands of players immerse their brain activity toward a video game by a device known as the NeuroGear, a dome helmet that the users place on their head to dive into a new world. And with the NeuroGear on, the user can control a new virtual body to interact and play in the newest game in Ninjago; Ninjago Online. To fight monsters in the game, challenge players in duels, or to interact with friends to form guilds as a team. This was the elite movement in the gaming industry, but it was also the worst event to happen when the Overlord Virus attacked the MMOVRRPG.

On opening launch of Ninjago Online, thousands of players have logged into the game to venture into the new world of gaming, meet up with friends, and to fight along side each other. And when the day was getting late to have players call it a day and log off, the worse had began there. Many realize they couldn't log out of the game from their menus as it was missing from the system. Many thought it was a bug that hasn't been patched yet. Others weren't sure of what was happening. But when the players were teleported into beginning town's square, the Overlord Virus revealed itself as their captor and explained its own set of rules.

The main rule was survival.

The virus was once suppose to be a boss for the game created by Cyrus Borg and his partner Neuro Hisoko. But the binary codes of the boss became corrupted to become a virus and hacked its way into game and changed it into its own image. When a player dies in the game, their avatar becomes part of the Overlord's stone army to become the hardest boss in the game. The only way to free everyone in the game was to defeat the virus. But the more players join the ranks of virus' army, the harder to defeat the virus became. Since then, players have formed guilds, players became loners, theives, shop owners, or murderers. This was their new life when being trapped in the game.

* * *

The virtual sun rose high in the afternoon sky of a small village. A teen with spiky burnet hair gazed at the village out from the window of his room in the inn to sigh softly and turned to close the window and flopped on his bed. He laid in silence for a couple minutes to comtemplate of his predicament. It's been a month since Kai and thousands of other players became trapped in the game and no one has made a dent on where the virus was hiding and from what he heard was that twenty more people have fallen to the game and became the virus' army. He sighed as it seemed like everyone was going to be stuck here longer than he thought.

For being trapped in the game, he had one thing on his mind for when he became trapped and it was his sister. His sister was probably worried about him a lot as well as his family, no doubt his body was transported in a hospital to receive care while being trapped. But he made a promise to himself to always be there and protect his sister. But with him in the game, he can't keep the promise. He sighed again to ponder his thoughts to close his eyes and try to sleep. But with the sunlight hitting his face made him grimace to stand up and climb out of his bed. He couldn't sleep his troubles away, he knew it. He had to get out and do something.

Kai opened his menu to browse his inventory and tapped on his attire to become surrounded in light to change. Simple armor covered over his chest and shoulders and biceps and red tunic shirt. Metal greaves covered his shins and boots with a katana strapped to his hip. And to top it off, he had a red bandana over his forehead. With everything secured on him, Kai left his room to walk out and explore.

The burnet glanced around his surroundings as he walked through the village's market area. Players interacting with NPC shop keepers, buying weapons, armor, to health items. He noticed that the players around him act like this was a regular day as if they were outside in the real world. But he knew that they were still worried when being trapped in a game. But with the players, it felt like it was a second life to them, having freedom to be themselve.

After walking through the market, Kai found himself at the village wall to think of what's outside on the wall. When being in a town or safe zone, players can't die to the elements of the game or other players. But outside the safe zones were the creatures of the game from skeletons to snake creatures known as Serpentine and others. But at night, there were far worse creatures that many call as Dark Creature and many don't know what kind of monsters there were. Many have gone to fight against the Dark Creatures for glory, but they weren't successful. The burnet brought himself back to turn on his heels and headed toward the inn for a meal as he was feeling peckish.

The door's bell chimed as he entered in to see players conversing with one another while others were enjoying a meal to make his way through in the restaurant and took a seat at the bar counter. As he gazed at the menu, he overheard on a couple players talking to one another about their ventures in the game's dungeons to snort as he didn't care as he has been in a few dungeons and hasn't found much of treasures at the end. Seemed like a waste of time to him. Finally he decided on what he wanted to have the NPC waitress take his order and have the dish in front of him to quietly eat.

His ears perked to the sound of the bell chiming as someone entered to glance over his shoulder to see two players that looked odd to him, almost shady. Both were burly players with purple markings etched in their armor and around their eyes. They both had snake like attire on their bodies with large swords brandished to their hips. Kai felt himself tense up to their appearence, but he figured they were passing by to make him turn back to his meal.

The two players glanced around the small restaurant to smirk to one another and meandered around. They ignored the players as they interacted with one another or ate their meals as they eyed at the individual players, observing them. They finally stopped at a table that had a boy, no older than thirteen years old, with wavy blonde hair and simple armor and sword to stand in front of him. The boy looked at them a bit nervous as they stared down at him to keep their smirks and took the dish he had in front of him and kept it out of his reach. "Hey!" the boy complained to try and get it back. "Give it back! That's mine!"

Hearing the complaints, Kai turned to see the two players tease the boy as they kept it out of his reach, no matter how much he tried to fight them back for it. It was starting to draw the attention of everyone. This wasn't right, he thought. Bullying a kid and taking his virtual food so his brain could think he was starving. The burnet looked at his knife next to his plate to take it and took aim. The utensil glowed a yellow aura as he charged it and threw it to hit the man's hand to make him yelp and release the plate, but it shattered on the floor. The two players turned to Kai.

"Really?" he huffed. "Just really? Out of all people in this game, you had to take food from a defenseless kid who I'm pretty sure worked hard to earn money and pay for his own when you can't. That's just lame." He walked over to them to move the kid behind him to shield him and glared at eye level to them. "Look around you, everyone here looks like they want to kill you for picking on a kid, because in this village, everyone here looks after one another. So if I were you two, leave while you got the chance." He turned to the kid to open his menu to search for something and had a golden tricket appear in his hand to hand out for him. "Here, take this to sell and buy yourself a few meals in the future." The boy smiled to accept it and left the restuarant.

The two players glanced at each other to observe the restaurant as every player had their hands close to their weapons to Kai and smirked. They quickly drew their swords out to slash at Kai, but the burnet was quicker to catch both blades to stun them as he pushed against their strength. He finally pushed them back to jump out of the way from their attack to defend himself in the tight establishment. Finally two more players came to aid the burnet as everyone else moved out to make room for them.

The three players stood across from the ones that started it to grip their weapons tightly. A player with a mace charged at one of them to swing his weapon toward his chest to have it parried and was kicked into the other one to leave Kai standing. The other burly player charged at the burnet to make Kai avoid his attacks to slide underneath a table as he broke through it and grabbed a plate to throw it at his face to stun him and pushed him against the bar counter to throw punches to his face. The other burly player grabbed Kai by the throat to throw him at the window to break through it.

Groaning, Kai picked himself up to watch the players leave the restuarant to run from the scene. He, however, wasn't finished with them to give chase into the alley they fled to. The chase finally came to a halt as the burnet came to a clearing of the alley and glanced around to find where they were hiding, but he couldn't spot them anywhere to scoff. _Cowards,_ he grumbled to himself and sheathed his sword. He glanced around once more to turn on his toes and started to headed out, but his ears perked to the sound of shuffling and quickly turned with his sword drawn.

They were back.

But what stood in front of Kai wasn't the two players from earlier, but in front of him was a single fortune cookie on a dish to make him raise his notched brow. He searched around to where it could've came from, but he couldn't see the players or anything to sheathe his sword again and cautiously grabbed the cookie to study it. How weird for a single fortune cookie to appear to him and broke it open to see a small slip of paper inside, like most fortune cookies would have. But it wasn't a fortune, it was a note to read it quietly.

 _To whoever receives this cookie, your strength and wisdom is recognized by the guild known as the Anacondrai Clan. Our recruiters were sent to seek out for the strongest players to seek a chance to the guild that will seek the quest to destroy the Overlord Virus. By accepting this offer, you will join the ranks as honorary members to receive high payment, better weapons and armor, and many other items. If you wish to accept the offer, head to the Hiroshi Labrynith Jungle where a convoy will lead you to the guilds hideout. We hope you accept this invitation as we all want to defeat the virus and leave this game. Yours turly, Master Chen._

Kai blinked to realize it was an invitation to join a guild. But he had to scoff as he didn't care for guilds as he joined a couple of them in the past, they didn't work out for him. But this guild had high expectations apparently with the conquest to defeat the Overlord Virus, not to mention it would mean he would get money and better armor than what he had currently. It sounded tempting to him. But his sister came to his thoughts that if he did join to fight against the virus, it would bring him one step closer back to her. The more he thought of it, the more it made him lead to accept it.

"If I join this guild, I'll be back with you, Nya." he said. "Just one step closer to leave this game then."


	2. Master Chen

**Chapter 2: Master Chen**

Thick foilage surrounded the teen as he ventured into the destination of the invitation he received from a day ago. The jungle canopy blocked the sunlight as he gazed around the area to be on alert with his hand by his katana. Sure he was going to meet up with a convoy that was going to lead him to the guild's headquarters, but it didn't mean Hiroshi's Labyrith Jungle was safe for players to wander in alone. Outside of the game, it was the same as in the game, it yielded the labyrith name as it's a maze for its thick foilage to have people become lost in the jungle. And in the jungle were wild beasts to attack unsuspecting players, which was Kai was being vigilant.

The spiky hair burnet kept walking down the dirt road while glancing around to huff in annoyance as he hasn't spotted the convoy that was mentioned in the invitation. He started to wonder if it was a set up and he was heading for a trap. He knew it was too convincing and he took the bait like a fool. The sound of branches breaking caused the teen to stop and quickly drew his sword out, ready to defend himself as he watched two figures emerge from the foilage. His chocolate brown eyes grew wide as he recognized the two figures in front of him, the two players from the restuarant that he fought before. He knew it was a trap now, so they could kill him and take his items.

"Well, well, Krait, looks like our samurai friend has accepted Chen's invitation." the player acknowledged. "I'm surprised actually."

"Same, Chope," Krait agreed. "So player, quite the punches you had back in the village, and we're happy to see that you've accepted Master Chen's invite to join the Anacondrai Clan. Please, state your name."

Kai kept his glare on them, but he carefully loosen his stance to cautiously sheathe his katana. With them saying about the invite and the name as Chen, he realized this was the convoy he was searching for. "My name is Kai." he replied. "And yes, I got this stupid invite, saying to come here and follow a convoy to the headquarters. I'm guessing it's you two then."

A cheeky smirk came from Krait to nod to his statement. "Indeed it is." he said to motion him to follow. "Come on, Chen doesn't have all day. You're probably the last one anyway. We got lots to do today." He turned to lead the way with Kai following behind and Chope tailing them.

The jungle became thicker to the burnet as the three were walking off the trail and had to move the large leaves away to see where he was going. Wherever this Chen was made him wonder why his guild's headquarters was off in the middle of nowhere in the jungle. Even for being the thickest jungle to become lost in. And yet, the name Chen sounded way too familiar to him, like he had heard that name before in IRL. But where though?

After walking for what felt like another half hour, the three finally came to a clearing to have Kai's eyes widen to what stood in front of him. A ruined temple stood in front of him with aged snake statues at the main entrance and thick foilage around the perimeter. Burning torches hung on the stone walls with fire pits underneath the snake statues blazing high to make Kai amazed to the area. Like a hidden temple in any other video game, Ninjago Online had done the same concept.

A hard nudge brought the teen out of his thoughts to see that Chope and Krait were still convoying him to follow with them as they climbed the weathered steps to the thick wooden doors. The doors opened to their presence and all three entered to have the doors close behind them and Kai was lead through the corridor to be in an open clearing where other players meandered around. Krait and Chope gave Kai the push to keep walking to the group and disappeared into another corridor to leave alone with the other players. Kai glanced around to feel a bit nervous as he glanced around at the other players as they branished different weapons than his katana and wore high leveled armor. Made him feel like the new kid at school, but he didn't show his nerves to them.

The burnet stayed outside of the group to keep to himself to lean against a stone pillar and glance around. Some players looked like bandits to others wore full suits of armor and other armor that made them look meancing. Large swords to axes and spears were out on display as the players were bragging of their conquests in the game to make Kai stand out more with his standard armor and tunic he wore. He quickly opened his menu to browse through what other armor he had to blink of the one in his inventory as he had forgotten about it from completing a quest to disappear behind the pillar and donned the armor on. He stepped out in the opening to be in red samurai armor to remove the mask and tied the red bandana around his forehead to glance around as the sound of a gong rang.

Two more of the players that looked like Crope and Krait swung at a metal gong to make the room become silent and have everyone's attention to the wooden doors on top of the center stairs. The gong finally stopped to have the two players stand by as the doors slowly swung open and a man stepped out to gaze at them below. Kai studied to see he was an aged man with black hair and goatee and red eye shadow around his dark eyes. He was dressed in a red ceremonial robe and black cape with an oddly shaped snake skull headpiece with a purple piece around his neck. Another man followed behind him, he too was dressed in a red ceremonial robe without the cape and had black hair and mustache. Kai had to guess that the one with the snake headpiece was Chen, the guild leader, and the other was maybe his second-in-command.

The guild leader gazed at the that came to his headquarters to smile softly. "Welcome, welcome," he said, cheerfully. "to the Anacondrai Clan's headquarters. And thank you for accepting our invitation about joining the guild to lead our conquest of the Overlord Virus." He had an around of applause to raise his hands to silent to continue. "As many of you have noticed on the invite, yes my name is Master Chen, yes the founder of Master Chen's Noodle House in IRL."

Kai's eyes widen in realization now to Chen's name as it came to him now. Chen was the owner to many restuarants in the real Ninjago and even in Ninjago City. There was even a restuarant to his hometown in Ignacia Village, that was how he knew of Chen's name. What was the owner of a large food chain doing in a video game? Maybe he had NeuroGear to have leisure time when running a lot of restuarants.

"Now, before we get into details of everything," Chen continued. "I have a confession to make." There were hushed murmurs among one another to raise his hands to silent them. "In order to join the guild, there has to be a initation. A tourament of sorts to determine here who has the guts and will power, strongest of the fittest, to vanguish the virus. With sixteen of you here, we only have eight openings available. Understand what I'm implying here?"

There was silence to have everyone think of the proposition. "So to join the guild, we must fight one another until you call who is the winner until there is eight of us left." a player with a sickle sword attached to his hip stated. "So you expect us to do it right here right now."

"You're correct about fighting one another," Chen said. "But we're not doing here, can't have weapons scattered on the floor. No, the tourament will be held back in the arena. Come, there are plenty of drinks and food to enjoy during the fights until it is your turn. There will be pre-fights to give the idea of what we are doing. Training our recruits as you would think." He motioned his hand to a corridor have Crope and Krait lead the way to the arena. "Please enjoy yourselves. The tourament will start in a couple hours."

Kai watched the many players nod to his offer and followed after the two members to watch Chen and his commander disappear back to the door. A tourament to join the guild sounded like a way to test a player if they were capable of this guild. The way Chen said it made the samurai suspicious of him. But he had to defeat the virus if he wanted to get out of this game and be with his sister and family. Being the last one in the room, Kai made sure his katana was strapped to his hip and followed after the remaining group.


	3. The Real Tournament

**Chapter 3: The Real Tournament**

To what Chen was saying earlier was true to say for the least. Metal clashed against one another as two memebers of the guild were training in the arena while Kai and the other players watched above them. Food and drinks were offered to the players to watch the fights by NPCs while some players cheered or took some bets. Kai had to scowl as it seemed pointless to place bets on a training match, but there were times some players had disarm their opponent. But when one training match ended, the next one came with the invited players indulging on the offered drinks and food.

As Kai took a sip of the virtual wine he was given, he glanced around to the arena and surrounding area. Just like the temple, the arena had an ancient feeling to it when being surrounded by the lush jungle. Aged and weathered stone walls with vines growing on the high walls with stone stalagmites jutting inward on the edges to give it a caged feeling to it. Torch lights posted on the high walls and along the seats where they watched the fights take place. And across from them was Chen on a throne of stone with his commander sitting next to him and another player, a female with red hair and yellowish orange armor watching the fights.

But Kai had to take note on Chen's smile to the fights while the female looked solemn almost.

The sound of a gong made the two memebers stop in their match to turn to Chen and knelt with their weapons on the ground. Chen motioned them away with his hand to make them nod and left the arena to turn to his visitors across from the arena while more memebers of his guild began to file to take their seats to surround the arena. "The time for our tourament has begun," he said. "to determine which lucky players will join our guild." The members roared in applaud while the sixteen players looked at one another while some were boasting. Chen silenced the crowd. "In order to join the guild, the match will be judged by me. My second-in-command, Clouse. And my daughter, Skylor. One match, one must be disarmed, the winner is in. So who would be our first volunteers, to determine their strength."

There was silence from the sixteen players until one player stood up. A player with ashy colored skin with dark eyes and hair wore black armor with an axe attached to back. He had a menacing grin on his face. "I'll be your first fighter, anyone else want to challenge Shade!" he bellowed.

More silence came to remaining players until a burly man with a thick beard with a spear stood up. "Your words would get the best of you if you keep boasting with that attitude. It would get you killed off quickly if you're not too careful." the man said to make Shade glare at him. "Very well, I accept your challenge. The name is Bolobo."

The guild's members cheered to the volunteers to have the two move down into the arena. But as soon as they entered, their armor was stripped off of them with their weapons still attached to them. A loud drum banged to make the guild member stomp to the beat with the other players chanting along. Kai couldn't help but cheer along as this started to feel exciting. Shade stood far across from Bolobo to draw out his axe to swing it around his body to slam it into the ground to shout. Bolobo, however, drew his spear out to glare at the man and stood calm as the chanting grew louder to make Chen silence everyone. "The first match of our tourament is underway," he exclaimed, excitedly. "Between Shade and Bolobo, first to disarm is declared victor and a member of the guild. Now begin!"

Shade shouted as he charged to the man with his axe blade charging a black aura to swing his axe at him. But Bobolo was already quicker than the man to arch his back and spun on his heels to avoid the blade to stand where he stood originally. The grey skinned man stopped to growl and charged at him to slash his blade to his opponent's chest to make Bolobo step back calmly to avoid the blade from hitting him. Kai watched in anticipation on the fight, one was calm and was more of passive fighting while the other was using anger and aggressive fighting. Both were in synced with each other.

As the two fought, the samurai directed his chocolate brown eyes to Chen to see him talk to Clouse as they observed the fight while Skylor was silent with an expression of worriness on her face. What was she worried about during these fights?

Shade was breathing heavily to slump to one knee with his axe supporting him to glare at the calm man who looked like he didn't use all of energy. He took a deep breath to get back to his feet to charge at him again, but Bobolo simply held his foot out to trip the man to slump on the sandy ground to cough out any he got in his mouth flip over to see the man walk toward him. "Simple boasting gets you to use all of your brain energy to fighting like this then," Bobolo said with his spear glowing a green aura. "Anger, aggression, sloppy, this would get you killed off and far from being in this guild." Shade looked at him, scared a little, to quickly charge his axe and swung at the man to have the spear parry it and have it no longer in his grip next to him. Bobolo's spear was at his neck.

The crowd was silent to become stunned when they were cheering for Shade to win.

A small chuckle broke the silence to have all sixteen players turned to Chen while the other guild members were chanting a word to make Kai almost sick to his stomach. _Kill._ Chen's chuckle soon broke out to a loud laugh while the members were chanting the word louder to make Bobolo and Shade worried as it was towards them. "Finish him!" Chen demanded. "To become a member in the guild, you must kill off the weakest player. Only the strongest can join the ranks! Now execute him!"

Kai's heart stopped to what Chen just said. It all made sense now. It wasn't just a tourament to join a guild. It was a tourament to fight to the death to join the guild. The invitations to find the strongest players, an arena where players can kill other players without being safe zones. The food and drinks to give players the false sense of security before their fate. And the look Kai saw on Skylor as she was worried for their lives being killed to the Overlord's army.

Bobolo saw the fearful look on Shade's face to keep his spear on his neck. The chanting grew louder to have his spear glow a red aura to make Shade quiver. But Shade saw how the sun was now disappearing to make their shadows appear more prominently and longer. And soon a sly grin appeared on his face to make the bearded man look at him quizzically. A startled gasp escaped from the man to see a black sword has pierced his chest from behind with red crystilize pieces escape from his wound to drop his spear and fell to his knees and his HP bar dropped drastically to only a corner piece was left. Bobolo was stunned to believe what happened to watch Shade got to his feet and walk over to him with his axe in hand.

"You claim that my fighting was sloppy, using all of my energy to fight with anger." Shade murmured to chuckle. "No, everytime I was on my knees, I was quickly placing traps in the ground for when you triggered them with your shadow. And when the sun finally descended to stretch your shadow, it released the trap." Bobolo merely gasped to what the grey skinned man said to realize he wandered into a trap. "That's right, I'm a hunter, using the shadows to my advantage. Now with you like this and me still standing, looks like the strongest of the fittest after all." He raised his axe to hear Bobolo scream as he swung to only have a pile polygonal shards in Bobolo's place.

Shade turned to the arena observers to shout in victory and have all guild members, Chen, and all remaining invited players cheer to his victory.

Only Kai was the only one that wasn't cheering.

"What a change of events!" Chen shouted. "Our first victor is Shade with his clever tactics of hunting traps. Who is next to join our ranks!?"

All of the players were shouting to be the next challengers while Kai looked around them nervously. This couldn't be happening to the samurai, this was sadistic to believe. These players were willingly ready to kill other players to join a guild that encourages it. A tourament of entertainment. He had to get away from this, this wasn't what he thought it would be. With everyone distracted, the samurai quietly slipped away from the arena to start heading down the corridor, but to only bump into Chope and Krait. He gulped quietly as they both grabbed his arms and started dragging him back to the arena. "Seems like we got a deserter here," Krait acknowledged to keep a strong grip on the samurai as he struggled. "A new contestant for the tourament."

The two drug Kai down to the arena to toss him through the barrier to have his armor stripped from his avatar to only have his chest bare with pants on. The crowd grew loud to the new contestants in the arena as Kai picked himself up to see another player across from him. A teen with long shaggy blonde hair that covered over his left eye with the sickle blade attached to his hip to make the samurai nervous as he was in the deathmatch. Kai watched as Krait walked up to Chen to talk to him and nodded. "It appeared we had someone try to leave the guild." Chen announced to make everyone grumble in disappointment to his actions. "That is unlawful when I offered you a chance to join my guild and provided you with food and drinks. For that, you must fight your way out of this crime or die trying. The new match will be Lar versus Kai, only one will remaining standing."

Kai's heart was racing to everything now as they were chanting with the drums banging to make him worried of his outcome. They were seeing him as a criminal and now he had to fight his way out of it. He didn't want to kill other players, but Lar looked like he wanted to kill him. This was a nightmare for him now.


	4. Mercy

**Chapter 4: Mercy**

The sounds of the drums banging loudly with the defeaning chants were made the burnet's world spin to everything happening around him. He was trapped in a pit to where players have to kill one another to join Chen's ranks in his guild. He witnessed the death of Bobolo recently to Shade and now that he tried to escape and got captured, he was the next contestant to fight his way out of the tourament. By killing Lar. or Lar killing him.

The samurai studied his _opponent_ carefully to exhale quivering breaths. A teenager that stood shorter than him with long blonde hair that seemed to get into his eyes. An easy way to disarm him if he overpowered him with his height and quick blade. But he didn't know how well Lar could fight with the sickle blade. And he didn't want to disarm him and kill him as well. He couldn't make himself do it. Neither could Chen.

"Listen, Kid," he said softly to reach out to him. "We don't need to do this. Chen can't make us fight and kill each other. We both know we don't want to be part of the virus' army. Let's not fight and we can leave together and live to fight another day."

"Kid!?" Lar shouted, annoyed. "Kid!? Just because I'm fourteen and short makes you think I'm a little kid. I hate it when people call me that. And I don't care of what crap comes out of your mouth. I've been stuck in this game for a long time and want to get out. And the only way to get out is to join this stupid guild and kill you." He gripped his blade tightly to have it glow a bright blue aura as he got into a stance to scream as he charged. As he got close to the samurai, he leaped into the air to swing the blade in an arc to make Kai jump back. But with the end of the curved sword in the sandy ground, Lar then flipped his body to deliver a kick to the burnet's chest and dislodged his sword.

Kai finally regained footing after the force of the kick to feel a bit stunned. Lar had speed and surprising strength to use the heavy sword. But he did note that he did have a temper tantrum for calling on him for his height. That was beside the point of Kai's dilema. The real problem was that the blonde teen wanted to leave the game and he was willingly wanting to submit to Chen's leadership and kill other players like Shade done to Bobolo. Lar was out of his mind, that could be tramatic to a teenager at his young age. The only way to finish this match was to give the crazed man a show and beat the kid and not kill him.

Taking a deep breath, Kai stood tall to let the tip of his katana dip into the sandy ground and slowly circled the teen to make him become alert. The crowd became intense to keep chanting and cheering for the two teens. "If you wish to follow this lunatic," he said, the sand shifting as he dragged his sword with him. "Be that way then. But following him will mess your mind up at a young age, Shortie." Lar snarled his teeth to shout and charged at him to make Kai kick the sand up with his sword to have the particles hit his blue eyes to make him grimace and stop to rub his eyes. "And by following him, you'd become a new person that you'd wish you've never became. What do you have to say then?"

"I told you to stop calling me for my height!" Lar bellowed to remove the sand thrown at him to grip the sword tightly to charge at the teen with his sword glowing the same blue aura. As he got near, Kai's katana became a bright red aura to swing the blade and both blades crossed to feel the charged power from both weapons expell as they pushed against each other. Kai pushed against the teen's strength to feel the curved blade move closer as Lar was using his anger for his advantage. But the burnet failed to see Lar lash his leg out to his shin to lose his stance and screamed as he felt the blade graze his abdomen to stumble back. The crowd above cried louder for the blonde teen.

His chocolate brown eyes watched as his HP bar went down a bit to see the crystalize gash he received to snort. He now understood what he was doing. If he wanted to play dirty, then Kai will have to as well. Glancing around, the samurai spotted a latern perched behind him to see it was burning oil to quickly rush to it with Lar following closely behind. He quickly swiped the blade across the oil to coat it and soon ignited to spin on his heels to attack the teen while he defended himself against the fiery blade. With a quick hand, Kai swung at Lar's arm that held the sword to hear him cry out and soon his entire right arm burst into flames for a quick second. Kai smirked, fire damage to a player.

"What an interesting turn of events!" Chen shouted, practically jumping from his throne. "Two well trained swordsmen in the arena, playing unruly to one another. One lashing out attacks when the other is distracted and the other fighting fire with actual fire. This is a sight I can't keep my eyes off of. A true fight to watch as Shade's initation. Keep fighting to the death."

Kai could hear Lar breathing heavily as he held his right arm close to his body to know that fire damage will effect him and his health for sometime since they couldn't use health potions in the arena. Lar shouted again to charge toward Kai to attack him with full force to make the samurai defend the blows with bits of fire breaking off the sword. As the two fought, the fire sprung on Lar's arm again to make him scream in pain and continued to attack the teen while landing punches or kicks to make him lose his balance and inflict damage to him with his sickle sword. The fight became intense to have everyone shouting for both teens to have one of them win.

Both teens were breathing heavily with their HP bars low to make them sluggish to move. Their minds controlling their avatars were wearing down to the point where they'll mentally exhaust themselves. Kai watched Lar's stance carefully to see he was going to attack again to brace himself with his blade charging to a orange hue and parried the blade to watch as the curved blade broke and soon shattered into pieces in his hand. The samurai quickly then swiped at Lar's right arm to sever it as he fell back to have it shatter into pieces as well.

The fight was now over.

The loud chanting for final kill roared loudly to make Kai gaze around the crowd to glare at them for their theatrical show. He turned to Chen to see his evil grin and glanced back at Lar as he laid on the floor, exhausted. The armless teen gazed at the stub of his right arm to breath heavily in exhaustion and fear to look at Kai with wide blue eyes. Kai looked deep into Lar's eyes to see the fear flash before him to gaze at his sword to the helpless teen. Since the beginning of the fight, he promised himself he couldn't kill another player for a crazed man. And looking deep into the eyes, he could see Lar was begging for mercy.

Instead of killing the small teen, the samurai quickly spun on his heels and threw his sword toward Chen. Time to seem to slow down as the man watched the blade fly toward him and watched as the katana struck next to his head and the crowd became silent. Everyone gazed at the burnet with utter silence as he glared at everyone to turn back to Lar and scooped the blonde teen in his arms and both the left the arena to have the entire guild shout at them for the fight.

* * *

Kai's footsteps echoed in the stone corridors of the ancient temple as he scanned around for a place to help Lar as he fell asleep in his arms until he came to a wooden door to push it open. It was a small storage room with barrels and crates littered around to lie the small teen down on the crates in a makeshift bed to hear him groan. He smiled softly to open his menu and search around his inventory until he found his last health potion to have it appear in his hand. His mind crossed about using the potion for himself as his health was low, but he'd rather use it for Lar as he was missing his right arm to tip the bottle in his mouth to watch him drink ravenously and poured the last drop onto his stub to watch an outline of his arm appear. It was starting to repair itself rather quicker than letting time fix it.

"Thank you," he heard Lar groaned to smile again.

The smile remained on the samurai's face to watch him sleep as his arm was repairing itself, but his smile disappeared as he heard the door swung open. Out of instincts, Kai quickly opened his menu to draw out a dagger and spun his heels to defend the blonde teen. Chen stood in front of him, alone. But Kai figured the rest of the guild was waiting outside for them, killing them for himself for not following his law. Chen's cheeky grin was plastered on his face to gaze at his glare and looked past his shoulder to see the slumbering teen.

"My my, quick reflexes, high accuracy on the throw." the guild leader say to open his menu and have Kai's katana appeared in his hands. He held it out to Kai, like a gift. The burnet eyed the man cautiously to slowly take his sword back and sheathed it into his scabbarb. "But that fiery attitude of yours reveals you have a soft heart as well. Not like that's a bad thing there."

"What are you talking about?" Kai grimaced. "You're a sick man, forcing others to fight to the death for entertainment. Making me almost kill this kid. For what? A spot in your guild."

Chen's face turned sour to his comment, but he quickly regained his composure to look at the teen with a soft smile. "What you say of me may be true," he continued. "However, the strongest of the fittest may win, but it's to test their ability as well. Their temptation if they were willingly wanting to kill players. You showed the opposite for once, by not killing a player. But instead mercy for him." He started to pace around to make Kai keep an eye on him incase he was going to attack him. "The guild was enraged with your actions, demanding for you both to be killed for not having a victor. I made them change their minds and instead have both claimed as victor. Both of your strengths proved me a decent fight to know what you're capable of. For that, welcome to the Anacondrai Clan, Kai and Lar. And for being part of the guild, you must become my bounty hunter and will train young Lar as your apprentice. What do you say?"

He felt stunned to his words. Both of them were victors to his tournament and were now part of the guild. Something he didn't want to be part of in the beginning, but he found himself now part of it. And now he was now going to be Chen's bounty hunter and have Lar as an apprentice with him. A thought crossed his mind about his allegience to the guild now. If he refused it, the guild would kill both him and Lar and he worried for the small teen's safety. By joining it, it would spare them both from Chen's death grip.

Taking a deep, Kai knelt to one knee. "I accept my allegience for the guild."

Chen chuckled deeply in his throat. "I knew you would."


	5. Hidden Plans

**Chapter 5: Hidden Plans **

To what Chen had spoke to him before, the man had kept his word for the samurai and the teen he fought against in the arena. It had been over month since he had joined the guild, Kai was the leader's bounty hunter, hunting down deserted guild members that had fled from the headquarters or hunting down other players that had a bounty on their head for the rewards. And along with his part of the Anacondrai Clan, he had obtained a perk for his player avatar; Hunter Senses, the ability to heighten his hearing and vision. For Chen's use, Kai was the ultimate hunter and deadly killer if he ordered him to.

Along with the samurai, the spiky haired burnet also had Lar training beside him as his apprentice and partner. As much the blonde haired teen didn't want anyone to train him as he was capable of fending for himself, he was reminded that the guild would kill him for not following the set rules to him for he and Kai had broken the arena rules since the beginning. So reluctently, Lar had to follow under Kai's command and train beside him, as much as he hated it. Like the samurai, the small teen was attired in blue samurai armor with a katana as his sword as his old sickle sword was destroyed by Kai's hand.

Kai found himself standing next to Chen's throne as a match was undergoing in the arena. Only it wasn't a match to the death like when he first joined, it was a normal match for guild members to train for both training to those fighting and entertainment for those watching. Next to him was Lar, standing around bored, and next to Skylor as she sat next to her father to watch the matches take place. He couldn't help himself become marvel to her appearence with her red hair pulled tight in a ponytail, her deep green eyes and strong attitude for when she trained in the arena to always become the victor. The girl glanced over her shoulder to see that Kai was staring at her to watch as he quickly averted his eyes away to chuckle quietly.

The match in the arena had ended when Krait had disarmed his opponent to make them kneel in front of Chen for the fight and show to make the crowd cheer. The third match of the night had finished. "Excellent performance." Chen commended as the two fighters left the arena. "We're one step closer to accomplishing our goal of defeating the virus and leave this game. For now, you are excused for the evening, go enjoy yourselves for the night." He watched as his entire guild agreed to his dismissal and all started to leave.

The samurai watched as everyone left the arena to turn his attention to Skylor as she was leaving as well to muster the courage to talk with her. He turned to Lar to nod to him. "Go on and get some rest." he ordered. "We'll train at the crack of dawn. I've got some business to take care of."

"Yeah, whatever." Lar mumbled to turn and leave the arena.

When Kai stood alone after everyone had left, he quickly followed after where he last thought the female player disappeared to and searched around for her. He quickly spotted orange armor at the end of corridor to quietly followed after her as she moved quickly through the lower levels of the temple. The area soon grew dark to grab a torch off the wall as he made his way through in search of the girl and found himself in a dead end to huff and turned to head back. But he felt something grab him from behind to cause him to drop the torch and was drugged into a small room with the stone door shutting behind to hide them from view.

Kai's virtual heart was racing, but quickly calmed down as a latern had lit up to reveal Skylor with a sigh of relief look on her face. Both were quiet for a moment until Skylor finally moved away from the samurai. "You weren't followed, were you?" she demanded to know. Kai shook his head as he did send Lar away and he was the only left in the arena stands. "Good. Can't have prying ears around here. Especially since you followed me. Now you're more likely to report my father of what I'm doing."

"Doing what exactly?" Kai inquired. This was the first time he followed her and didn't know she was doing something secretive until now. What was she hiding?

A sigh came from the girl to brighten the latern more to reveal the small room they were in was actually a tunnel with crates and barrels around them. And without his perk, Kai could hear the sound of crickets and frogs of the night; a tunnel to lead to the outside. "This has been what I've been doing." she admitted. "You know those deserters that fled from my father's guild, they wouldn't have gotten far if it hadn't been for me giving them supplies to leave. But with you and Lar as the bounty hunters, this has been troublesome lately. You're more likely going to report this."

Kai glanced around to the supplies to the girl as she checked the inventory around them. He couldn't believe it, Skylor was a savior to help people leave the crazed man's tournament. And because of this, he had been tracking them back to the guild. No wonder the girl had glared at him before when he brought them. But now he found the source. "I'm not like your father." he said to look at the medallion on his armor to grumbled as he was part of the guild, purple snake weaving around a staff. "Nor do I want to be part of this guild. Not anymore."

"Then why are you here then? What made you come to this trap?" Skylor demanded.

"I only came because I was promised a way out of this game. Like everyone else was. Outside of this game, I got a sister that probably misses me along with my family. So yes, I came to this trap. Regretted it since then. The question is why are you doing this?"

Another sigh came from the girl to face the samurai and glanced at her medallion to tear it off her neck. "My father is a cruel man, and this isn't like him at all," she said to toss it aside and heard the metal bounce on the stone floor. "I've had it with him and the cruel way to make players kill one another for glory and I've been helping those that want to get away and start a new leaf in this game. Sooner or later, I too need to get away from this because my father can't keep this up for long. Now I can't if you're here and now this operation is scraped. The only way now is to kill you from spilling anything." She quickly drew out a sword to swing at his head.

But Kai had already read her mind to draw out his sword and stopped it from hitting his neck. And with a quick twist, he disarmed the sword from her grip and had the blade at her neck instead. He saw the fear flash in her green eyes, but instead he sheathed his sword. "There is no need to do this." he stated. "I too want to get away from this because I can't stand Chen's ways in this game. Like Bobolo, those other players fell victim to the _victors_ and I can't stand him. I need to get away and get Lar away as well. A kid like him doesn't need this. He could be better off if he left with me. And we'll need your help."

Both stood in silence to nod. A chance to finally leave the game where the bounty hunter can't even hunt the runaways. Not only that, start a new life in the game. They had the armor, supplies, and money from the guild they had received as payment. They could do anything when they finally flee from this nightmare of a guild.

* * *

Outside of the stone door, a pair of feet had traced down to the fallen torch on the floor to notice light pouring from the wall to carefully listen to the conversation. Clouse could hear the voices of Skylor and Kai on the otherside to become interested of what he heard. A hidden room where the guild's runaways had started from. And from what he had noted, it seemed like a couple more runaways were going to desert the guild. Something that seemed that will pique Chen's interest as well. No more runaways after he got with the guild leader of this news.

The man turned on his heels to make his way down the corridor of the temple and glanced over his shoulder. "You can attempt this petty desertion, you two." he mumbled softly to himself. "But not until Chen is finished with you. He'll make sure of it."


	6. Desertion

**Chapter 6: Desertion**

Sunlight broke through the open window of the temple to make Kai open his eyes as the virtual sun was on his face to grimace at the brightness. He finally pulled himself up to wake up more and glance around the empty room. A empty bed next to him made him raise his notched brow as Lar was missing to immediately realize he forgotten he had to train the teen. That was what he got for helping Skylor move and store supplies to leave the guild for him, her, and Lar. The burnet quickly hopped out of his cot to don on his armor and rushed out of the room to head for the training grounds.

Out in the open jungle, Kai glanced around the training grounds to find his apprentice to notice he wasn't anywhere around. The guild members were off training, but the blonde teen wasn't in the group getting trained by others. Something didn't seem right for the samurai as he stood alone and pondered where he had wandered off to. An alert popped in his menu to open it as a message came from Chen to open it and read it. Skimming along the note, he was to report to his office to sigh and quickly left. Hopefully he'll bump into Lar along the way.

* * *

Kai stood in front of the large wooden doors to take a deep breath. He had not bump into the small teen along his way to begin to worry about him. But he pushed that thought away to knock on the door and entered. The spiky haired teen glanced around the large room with Chen sitting at a desk and his second-in-command, Clouse, next to him. Like as usual. Normally when Kai had been sent to Chen's office, it was because of a bounty was announced and he was sent to retrieve it. Seemed like it was the same old, same old.

Making his way to the center of the office, Kai took a knee and bowed his head. He always hated doing this for the guild leader because it made him want to leave the guild sooner than before. The man was getting too much respect like he was outside with his restaurants. "You requested my presence for another bounty?" he greeted.

The cheeky grin on Chen's face appeared to pull himself away from his desk and stood in front of the samurai. "Stand up." he commanded to have Kai rise to his feet. "As for a bounty? In a way, of sorts, yes it is." He began to pace around the samurai to make him feel nervous. "We have another runaway from the guild and you know what the rule is. You can never leave the guild until the time you die in the game." He saw him nod as he knew the rule. "But. . .unfortunetly, there was an accident when I had to make the bounty and I accidently placed the bounty on the wrong person." He opened his menu to tap on the item and have it appear in Kai's hand.

Kai looked at him curiously to what he had said. Accidently placed the bounty on the wrong person was something he wouldn't do as Chen always made sure it was the person he wanted captured. He unrolled the parchment to see who the target was, but his chocolate brown eyes widen to the name and picture; Skylor was the target. A sword was drawn from behind him, but he was distracted to notice it and felt the sword pierce him from behind to see the blade out of his chest to collapse to his knees. His HP bar dropped a little to gasp quietly to see Chen's glare to growl at the man. He found out about his daughter's escape operations. "You purposely placed the bounty on her." he snarled. "On your own daughter even!"

"You'd think I wouldn't find out about your little secret of my other runaways from the guild!" Chen retorted back. "No one leaves the guild. And thanks to my second-in-command reporting this, I know that I can't trust many people around me. Including you, Kai. And yes, I made the bounty on her, but she doesn't know that. I simply told her to run and hide for her safety. But to show your loyalty to me, you must retrieve her back for trial."

Kai growled to wretch the sword from his back and pulled himself to his feet to toss it aside and drew out his katana. He wasn't going to listen to this man anymore, not when he's threating his daughter's life. Rebellion was what he wanted to do since the beginning. "Never." he hissed. "I will not hunt her down and kill her."

A chuckle came from the man to make him tense his muscles, ready to strike the guild leader down. "I knew that would be your response." he said to walk back to his desk. "Which is why I'm giving you a little. . .motivation."

The doors opened to make Kai spin on his toes to attack those that were going to ambush him. But his eyes became to what he saw to feel afraid. "Lar." he gasped, quietly. The blonde haired teen had been escorted into the office by Krait and Chope with his hands bound behind his back and a gag tied between his teeth. To make worse for the samurai, Kai noticed that Lar had small lacerations on his body to know he was being tortured to drain his HP to a low level. He could see the fear in his blue eyes to turn to Chen as he flashed his sly grin.

"Complete your mission," the man demanded. "Then I won't kill him, or you, or Skylor even."

* * *

The jungle was thick as he marched his way through to feel guilt claw his chest. To his motivation, Kai had to do this for his safety and Lar's as well. He agreed to hunt Skylor down, unless Chen released the younger teen and help him find the girl. To which he agreed. So now Kai and Lar were both on the hunt. And this would be challenging as well. Skylor knew of the area more than they would, she would use the jungle to her advantage. With its thick foilage and unknown monsters, Kai and Lar would face danger of the game before facing Skylor.

Kai stopped for a moment to glance around and listen carefully. He activated his perk to have silence surround his background and hone in the sounds of the person he was looking for. So far, he heard nothing to deactivate it and continued his way with Lar following behind. Both have been silent since they started their search, not wanting to talk since then. A sigh came Lar to make Kai glance over his shoulder. "Kai, I wanted to say thank you for helping back there" he mumbled. "I don't think I could've gotten out of there if you weren't there. So. . .thank you again."

A small smile escaped from the samurai for the small teen. He was glad to get him out of that mess. It was his fault that he got Lar into it because he wanted to get himself and Lar with Skylor's help. But now, they were all in danger by Chen's wraith. "It was nothing." he said to give his back a pat. "I couldn't let those jerks get the best of us. But let's worry about that later, Let's find Skylor and actually get out of here. We can start a life of own than this damn place of a guild." He saw him nod with a small smile as it sounded like a decent plan. "The question now is where is she? She can be anywhere and is very lethal with her sword. The best is to-"

A loud battle cry alerted the two to watch as a orange blur leap from the trees toward them. Kai quickly pushed Lar away and drew his sword to stop the blade from striking him. He struggled against Skylor's strength and felt her kick him in the abdomen to stumble back. He got to his footing to stare into her blazing green eyes and her red hair had fallen around her shoulders than her ponytail. He could see the fire burning as she shouted to attack him with her sword and kept parry them. "Skylor, stop!" he shouted. "We're not here for this."

"I trusted you and now I have this bounty on my head." the female player shouted to strike at his legs, which he parried against. "Now I have to run here for safety because my father told me to. I should've killed you when I had the chance."

Kai caught the blade again and grabbed her wrist. "It's not that." he replied. "I didn't report it to him. Clouse did, and Chen accidently placed the bounty. It was for someone else." He knew that part was a lie, because Chen told him to lie if he found her. "But we're being forced to find you. Lar's life was in danger if we didn't find you. Chen was going to kill him if we refused. I'm doing this for our safety. But now that we found you, we can actually leave together since we're far from here."

The red haired girl gazed into his eyes to see the truth coming from him. She glanced at Lar as he was picking himself up to see the fear on his face to drop her sword and wrap her arms around him. He was relieved to make her come to her senses. He quickly found his lips being pressed against hers to feel himself lost to her kiss to pull away and to stare into her eyes. But it was cut short as an arrow shot out of a crossbow to strike into Skylor's back to have her gasp and collapse to the ground. Afraid, Kai caught her as she fell to notice it was a paralysis arrow and glanced around to know where it came from.

His eyes widen as he watched Krait and Chope move from the foilage. Both armed, ready to kill the three traitors. "See, I told you they would lead us to her." Chope said. "And with this, we can kill the traitors." Kai felt his heart racing to notice Lar was taking in shallow breaths of fear. They were being followed, cornered, and now marked as traitors. They had to get away now, but not with Skylor unable to fight to the poison, and with him and Lar unaware of their presence. This was their key for desertion now.


	7. The Start of a New Life

**Hey everyone, this A/N is to let you know that this is the last Kai chapter of this multi-story of my Ninjago-SAO story. But don't fret for I have another ninja ready for his adventure in the trapped video game world. I probably won't post that for a couple weeks to get some chapters typed ahead of time. Anyway, enjoy the final chapter of Kai's adventure of Ninjago Online.**

* * *

 **Chapter 7: The Start of a New Life**

Panic and fear gripped Kai's body to what was happening around too fast. He and Lar had found Skylor as she fled for the _accidental_ bounty on her head from her father. But after they found her, they were cornered as Krait and Chope had fired a crossbow bolt into her back. Leaving him worried for her safety and now his and Lar's as the two guild members had appear on scene. With these two, Kai knew he wasn't making it out alive with his panicked state.

Krait studied the stunned girl as she couldn't move from her predictament for he coated the bolt with a paralysis poison. He smirked as he wanted it to be that way. The man turned to the two teens to see the fear they possessed. All too easy. "Fine work, bounty hunter." he commended. "Doing everything like Chen ordered you to. So great work for finding the target."

Kai glanced at Skylor to see the fear and anger in her eyes toward him as he thought he lied to her. And he didn't at all. He wanted to get her away from this madness, like him and Lar. "I don't care what Chen had ordered me what to do." he said with malice in his voice. "I'm only finding her so we can get away from this nightmare. Why did you follow then? What purpose do you have here?"

"Ooh trying to play as the tough guy for the kid and girl." Chope laughed. Lar growled to the mention of his short height. "I guess you didn't hear as well, but with the princess' bounty, there was another bounty for two traitors of the guild. And we were sent to deal with the traitors, bring a tricket to prove their death and bring the girl back. Simple as that. With her dealt with, we can take care of you with ease. Unless you surrender and accept your death to become the Overlord's army."

He couldn't believe what he heard. Chen had the way with words to make him find Skylor and join the guild. But he was a liar as well to make him and Lar the traitors to the guild. Now there was a bounty on all three of them. He couldn't let this happen. Not now, even when the moment of leaving the guild was close for them. Even the thought of being close to his sister was far to reach, but he didn't want this to happen. Instead of showing his fear, his chocolate eyes glared at the two to stand guard of Skylor and gripped his sword tightly. He heard shuffling rush next to him to see Lar was next to him and held his katana tightly. Kai smiled to have him on his side and both took a powerful stance.

The two guild members merely laughed to two samurais to draw out their weapons. Chope with a mace and Krait with a claymore sword. All four players glared at each other until the two guild members charged with their weapons glowing a bright purple aura to leap into the air. Kai and Lar quickly strafed away as they landed on where they once stood and crossed both katanas. Both blades glowed a bright red and blue aura as they shouted and thrust toward the two players as they attempted to block it. But with the combined power, the two Anacondrai Clan members were pushed back to smack into a tree to become a bit dazed and the samurais returned to their previous stance.

The pain subsided to pull themselves up and glared the _traitors_ as they guarded the target. Chope shouted as he charged first to swing the blunt weapon to have it blocked by Kai's sword and soon felt a kick to his face as Lar jumped onto Kai's arm to deliver the kick and fell back. Krait followed after his companion to have the heavy sword dragging on the ground to thrust it toward their chests, but both dodged the blade to lash at his unprotected sides to cause some HP loss. Both guild members were breathing heavily to charge again as the two samurais charged as well.

Kai found himself and Lar veering close to the victory against the two burly players as they fought hard. With him and Lar training hard in the past together against two who were only using brute force to fight against their opponent. Not to mention that Kai would let Lar leap off of him to inflict damage to either man. And Lar would also use his small height and speed to attack their legs. With both samurais, they knew they were an unstoppable force that would eventually help them leave the guild, even if it meant killing these two players or letting them run with a yellow back.

The katana was parried to make Kai lose his balance and soon felt the sharp end of the claymore strike him at his chest to feel the power and force through his avatar body and was flung back to hit against a tree. A groan escaped from him to watch half of his HP drain from that blow to pick his head up and watched as Krait charged at him to see he was going to deliver the final blow as he leaped in the air. He closed his eyes to brace himself. A quick shadow loomed over him to hear a startled gasp escape from someone to open his eyes and become wide as Lar stood in front of him with the claymore through his chest. The small teen took the blow for him, a powerful one that could kill one.

Lar glared at the man as the sword was in his chest to his smirk and groaned as Krait pushed it in further to hear him chuckle. He watched as a corner of his HP was left to grip his katana tightly to give it one final charge of his blue aura and thrusted into his chest to have the burly player collapse on his knees. Krait glared at him but gave him a small smile as his body glowed and broke into polygonal pieces. Lar turned to Kai to see his wide, fearful eyes to give him a smile. "Thank you." he said, quietly. His body glowed and broke into pieces. His katana and Krait's claymore fell to the ground.

His words remained frozen in his throat to what happened. Lar sacrificed himself for his safety. Here it was Kai that had been protecting him, now it was the opposite. Only it had cost the younger teen's life instead. It should've been him, not Lar. Guilt clawed his chest to glare at Chope as he mockingly laughed at his loss and pulled himself to his feet. He shouted to the top of his lungs to sheath his sword and grabbed the claymore to charge at the man with a dark red aura and swung it. The Anacondrai Clan player blocked the heavy sword, but his mace broke in his hands to have his eyes widen as the charged blade sliced through him. Kai stood behind him and Chope fell to break into pieces.

He stood alone now as three players were dead around him to sigh quietly as it happen too quickly. Lar, the younger teen he gave mercy to since they were forced to fight was gone as he wanted to help him get away from the guild. He was now gone and now going to become a soldier for the Overlord's growing army. Krait and Chope, the guild's recruiters doing another mission for Chen to have him and Lar were now kill instead of the samurai. Everything around was too much to him and now he stood alone with a paralyzed Skylor.

"Kai. . ." he heard Skylor say softly to him. The samurai turned to the girl as she had slowly picked herself up for the paralysis poison was wearing off. He could see the artifical tears cascade down her eyes to feel the tears form in his eyes. "I'm sorry about Lar. I knew you wanted to get him away from all of this. But there's nothing you could do. I'm sorry for getting you into this mess." She hung her head to grab her sword and looked at him to sigh. "I won't be of any help with you at this point. If we both leave now, you're in danger of me because of the bounty. Everyone in Ninjago Online by now has seen it. Only one of us will make it out of this jungle." The girl watched as his eyes became wide as she positioned the blade at her chest. She took a deep breath. "I'm sorry."

"Skylor, no!" Kai shouted as she thrust the blade into her chest and collapsed. He quickly rushed to her side to hold her. She remained quiet in his arms as her HP bar depleted to empty and gaze into his chocolate brown eyes to smile softly as her body glowed. She shattered into pieces in his arms and now Kai was left alone. He knew Skylor was right, if he had took her with him, the bounty was still with her and he was in danger. Only one person now could leave the jungle than what he originally wanted to happen. Him, Skylor, and Lar. It was just him now. He wiped the tears away and took off his medallion of the guild toss it away and left the area, never to be seen again.

* * *

His footsteps no longer crossed onto the dirt road, but instead they found themselves onto cobblestone paths. The samurai had been walking for hours and hours to days to get himself far away from Chen's guild. He now found himself in a new location that he didn't know he was in to cause him to open his menu and turned to his map. His eyes widen to the village's name to gaze around with interest. The village's name was Ignacia Village, his hometown name in IRL. The cobblestone paths lead the samurai around as he gazed at the ancient homes and shops with players and NPCs meandering around to gaze at the NPCs working in the rice fields. When he had heard that Cyrus and Neuro made the game accurate to the actual cities and villages and made them in ancient Ninjago, they weren't lying.

Kai was looking into the ancient village of his hometown as if he was in the past.

The samurai bumped into a structure to bring himself back and glanced at the building to feel his heart stop. He was staring into a two story building with a wide garage as the entrance that was surrounded by cherry blossum trees. He couldn't believe it as well that Cyrus and Neuro even created his actual home he had with his family. Everything was true to believe this. He gazed around to noticed a sign that said it was buyable to feel himself stammer on the offer. Players could buy fully furnished homes in the game than having to rent out inn rooms, even own shops to make their own income than having to venture in dungeons.

He gazed at the sign to read about the offer to realize it was a home he could also use as a shop as well to gaze at the options. He saw the option that caught his attention to realize he had the right amount of gold to buy it with plenty of leftover for himself. He wanted to get away from Chen's nightmare and start a new life. This looked like it was the only option he had to start new. Even though he didn't have Lar and Skylor with him. He would do this for them.

Without a second thought, Kai purchased the home and shop to have it glow a bright light to have players gaze at the building. The light died down to have the large garage open up to reveal a blacksmiths shop, complete with a large furnace, stone grinder, a mallet and anvil, and a set of iron ingots to get him started. A sign appeared at the entrance of the shop with the name he had given for his store; Four Weapons. A remembrance for what happened to the number of weapons that remained from the four fallen players. Kai gazed around in his new shop to have his menu alert him of new apparel appear in his inventory to tap on it. His armor was removed to be dressed in a simple white tunic and black pants with a leather apron over his chest and gloves for hands.

A sigh escaped from the spiky haired teen with a small smile and turned to his equipment. He had learned a little smithering back at Chen's guild from their blacksmith. But he knew that if he kept practicing the technique, he too would learn the perfect method to run a successful blacksmith shop. Kai grabbed a metal ingot turned to the furnace to begin working on his first weapon. "All right. . ." he mumbled. "Just focus and be careful on what on you're making."

This was his new life now until he was ready for the next adventure of the game. To destroy the Overlord Virus and be freed from the game.


	8. The Needed Material

**Jay**

 **Chapter 1: The Needed Material**

Hazel eyes were furrowed as an individual player was focusing on a project of his. Like some or many in the virtual world of Ninjago, he was only leveling up on his crafting abilities while others were leveling up on other abilities of their avatar. It's been a couple months since the incident of a corrupt virus had hacked into launching day of a VRMMORPG game and trapped thousands of players who dove their mind into the game with their NeuroGear. Now outside of the game, many of the players were in hospital care to be treated properly. While inside the virtual world, many were fighting foes and beasts for survival to avoid death and become part of the Overlord's growing army. To Jay, it was something he knew he didn't want to be part of.

His hazel eyes continued to furrow as his fingers were merging materials together in a holographic menu, being careful to not forge the item too fast to cause the item to break easily. But to not waste his materials too soon even to be precise on his finished project. To understand crafting abilities, it would allow the player to create items such as their own health potions to poisons for foes. And even smaller weapons unlike smithing for blacksmiths that created the variety of weapons. For Jay, he was creating a weapon that was unlike anything in the game. One that could give him an advantage to escape from combat when needed. In his head, he wanted to create a taser.

The materials he had in his hands merged together carefully to be surrounded in a bright light to have him shield it until it died down. He moved his arm away to smile softly as a black box rested on the table in his inn room to pick it up and study it carefully. It was what he wanted to create, being an inventor teen outside of the game, and turned to aim the box at the pillow on his bed. He pressed the button. But instead of what he wanted to happen, the box shook in his hand to make him raise his scarred brow and broke into pieces in hand and disappeared from the game. A quiet groan escaped from him to slump in his seat. All of that hard work and careful crafting for nothing.

A small hologram message appeared in front of him to move his hand down to open his menu. A message notifing him that he leveled his crafting ability to sigh and moved the message aside to browse his inventory and how much material he had left. He had enough to make one more attempt, but despite he leveled up on his crafting skill, he didn't want to risk it and lose all of his materials. He had to get something else. "I understand I leveled up on crafting," he murmured to himself. "But I think I need. . .something more conductive than copper ingot. If that's possible."

Another sigh escape from him to pull himself up and opened his menu to remove his armor and sword from his hip to walk out of his room. He needed to think, a walk through the town's square and park sounded nice to take a break. A cool breeze had hit his virtual face to feel amazed how the NeuroGear augmented his brain to feel the weather effects and nature around him as if he was outside of the game. He took a deep breath to gaze around the lit up streets from the lamp posts as it was dark now. If a player was in a village or town, it was a safe zone so they wouldn't die or have their Health Points, or HP bar, effected. But outside of the walls during the night were high level creatures that could kill unsuspected or unprepared players; they were called Dark Creatures.

The nighttime streets were filled with players as they were all having a night out with friends or themselves. Kids were laughing as they ran along the streets while couples were enjoying dinner at a cafe. He even noted that people weren't fazed it wasn't real to them, as if they think they weren't trapped in a video game. A perfect night as the auburn would see on TV with his parents. He wish he could enjoy this experience outside of the game if he didn't live out in the middle of nowhere. But this was the best thing he could get close to of enjoying a night. To which was where Jay found himself in the town's large park.

The towering trees surrounded the auburn as he walked along the cobblestone path to feel calm and serene to feel his clouded mind clear up to sigh calmly. Better than before after his failed crafting project. But with that thought now, it caused him to grumble a bit to walk to the edge of the park to stare at the large lake next to the village and took a seat at a bench. The water rippled softly against the walls of the park to have the auburn stare at it to see the mountains across from him. Been trapped in a video game for a couple months had been a downfall to many players. Dying in the game to become part of the virus' army, not being able to log out of the game. To even feel isolated from everyone, wondering if they'll ever defeat the virus to leave the game and be with those they love outside.

This was the part of the nightmare in the game. Just to stay alive.

The auburn player began to rethink of his failed project after he pushed those thoughts of the game away to focus on his device. He knew he had the right materials, enough to make one more. He didn't want to risk it making another and losing everything, plus he didn't want to waste all of his money when he knew he'll need it more for supplies, rent for rooms, and food. He chuckled to himself as it made him sound like an adult to save money or gold for that matter. But still, he had to find a better metal ingot that will be conductive and hold everything into place and not ruin all of his crafting abilities for nothing. A dungeon was his best bet to search for supplies. But he didn't know where he could search.

He sighed. "I'm so hooped in this game."

The sound of a branch snapping caused the player to have his ears perked and glanced over his shoulder. He thought he was the only one in this part of the park to make him jump a bit in his seat. But he debated it was another player or perhaps a guild enjoying the night together walking around. But when glanced over his shoulder, he noticed two players that looked oddly shady to him as they constantly looked around as they made their way through to duck behind his bench as they nearly saw him. He cautiously peeked to see them continue down the path, cutting through the trees and brush to make him raise his brow. He knew they were up to something, probably a raiding party or something on unsuspecting players. He had to help at least.

Opening his menu, Jay quickly equipted his armor, which consisted of chest armor over the upper half of chest and over his right arm. A small dagger attached itself to his hip with metal greaves attaching over his boots. With everything equipted, Jay began to carefully follow after the two players.

His footfalls became quiet as they stayed far from the players, but made sure they were in his view as he moved from tree to tree as they were looking over their shoulders. They moved past a brush to stop at the park's fountain, which made Jay stop and quickly climbed up to a tree and peered though the branches to get a closer look on the two players. A male with orange and green armor with a thick mustache with a large sword attached to his hip. And a female player with short black hair in the same armor color with a sword that serated edges along the blade to make Jay gulp a bit to the thought of the damage that sword could do to a beast or player in the game. Jay was right that they were in a guild based on the armor color scheme, but where was the rest of them if they were planning something?

"I'm tired of waiting, Flint." the female grumbled. "We've been on this hunt for a week and come up empty handed. This info broker of yours better know where the metal is for Nadakhan."

"In due time, Cyren." Flint reassured. "We will succeed on this mission. This info broker will know what she's doing. She has to make sure she's not being followed, like we were. Rest assured, we'll be back on the hunt and this time over with for good." He stopped as he heard something to make a small smile appear on his lips. "And here she is."

A small female player stepped out of a bush with a cloak on and the hood hiding her face that Jay couldn't see of but listened closely. Info brokers were players in the game that knew of rumors to actual locations of dungeons and treasures await in. But they don't give out information to any players, only to the right price. This made Jay curious now, these two players of a guild weren't planning an ambush. They needed something, a metal even, for their guild and couldn't find it to call in for help. And this info broker was their ticket.

"You weren't followed were you?" the female player asked.

"No, no, we weren't." Flint replied to open his menu to tap on the screen and have a small leather pouch drop in his hand. He held onto it for security. "It all depends if you weren't followed as well, Yuki."

"If I was being followed, I would've killed the easedropper outside of town." Yuki remarked to make Flint smirk and tossed the pouch to her. She caught it to have the pouch disappear into her inventory. She cleared her throat. "The metal you two seek is a very rare metal ingot that can be found off shore in a dungeon on a small island called Tiger Widow. Knowing many players, they don't wish to cross the sea and rather fight on land. That shouldn't be hard for the Djinn Skybound Pirates. The metal is unknown, but I've heard it has high crafting materials and possibly a good conductor, which makes it S-class in crafting materials. That is all I know, nothing else."

Flint played with his mustache as he ponder to what he heard, but just smirked. It was all they needed. They could continue their hunt now. "Thanks for it." he said to make the info broker nod and disappear in the foilage. He then turned to his accomplice. "What'd I tell you. She was a realible source. We got our source and now location for the metal. Let's send out a message to the others and will sail off at morning."

"She better be right on this." Cyren retorted. "I don't want to venture out for nothing."

"Like that'll happen," he said to began leading the way. "Let's get some shut eye, we got a big day ahead of us." They both disappeared until Jay was left alone.

The auburn dropped down from his hiding spot to have a small smile appear on his face. A rare metal that can be found out in the ocean of the game that had the requirement he needed. A high crafting material that was conductive. It felt like a dream to him, but this felt real to know. But this felt dangerous to venture alone as he thought about it. The beasts of the ocean in the game were unknown to many players, but apparently this guild knew more of the sea than the land and he didn't know what other creatures were on Tiger Widow Island. He wonder how he could get on that island as well with them. Maybe they had a ship he could stowaway on or something.

He stopped to clear his thoughts and pondered on one thing at a time. This guild were going to message other guild members their location and were going to leave in the morning. If he followed them carefully, he could definitely stowaway somewhere as they make their way to the island. And hopefully he could at least reach the area of the metal to snag a couple of ingots for his crafts before they do. That seemed the better plan as he carefully thought about it and began to follow after Flint and Cyren.

Tomorrow was not only a big day for them, but for Jay as well.


	9. Tiger Widow Island

**Chapter 2: Tiger Widow Island**

The auburn snored quietly to the soft rocking of the sea as the ship rocked against the waves. Exhaustion clouded him before he had fallen to sleep on the ship, _Misfortune's Keep_ , as he had snuck aboard earlier. He didn't expect the two guild members from last night to leave the town at the crack of dawn after the Dark Creatures disappeared for the night to make him wake up late and rush after them. Not to mention was that when he did caught up with them at the shore, there was about twenty guild members to make him nervous on how to sneak aboard. But eventualy, the auburn managed to sneak on board into the ship's storage area behind some crates. To where he found himself collapse and fell asleep.

He didn't know how long they've been sailing, but eventually Jay felt the ship rock abrupty to make him squawk out of slumber as crates fell around him. He took a couple deep breaths to collect himself and heard rushed footsteps on the upper decks to jump to his feet and rushed to a small port window. His hazel eyes were wide with awe to what they saw. A small island with towering mountains and a jungle surrounding everywhere; Tiger Widow Island. They finally reached the island where the rare metal was stored in.

Jay remained quiet as he watched the ship slowly reached close to shore and watched a small party jump onto shore to venture in. It was only half of the crew heading to the island, that meant the other half had to stay aboard. Which also meant they were also going to meander around the ship and soon discover Jay if he didn't move now or risk getting caught. He quickly made sure his armor was equipted and his small sword attached to his hip along with the remaining health potions in his inventory to quietly head to the upper decks.

He carefully made his way up the wooden stairs to cautiously peek his head to watch for any guild members patrolling around the main deck. All remaining members were converging with one another while a couple were practicing on fighting with their weapons to make Jay smile softly to make his way up and quickly hopped over the ship's railing to hang to the side. His breath quivered as he heard someone grumble to the sound he made after he leaped over the edge to quickly shimmy his way to the bow and hid as he saw a crew member look over the edge. He waited as the member finally shrugged it off to sigh quietly and dropped to land on the sandy shore and quickly made his way into the jungle. Too close of a call, he was close to his goal.

The humidity of the jungle made him grumble to the sensory input of the NeuroGear. Of course it would make him feel the humidity of a jungle like any other weather condition in the game. But he pushed it away to focus as he pondered where the hunting party went when he was still on the ship. He saw them disappear into the jungle exactly when he went in. But where could they have gone if he followed their exact entrance? The dungeon of where the item was stored could be anywhere on the island. But his search stopped as his hazel eyes spotted footprints in the soft ground and quickly followed it until he came to a small creek and followed it upstream. The creek came to an end as he spotted a temple at the entrance of a cave. It was the dungeon and he spotted the guild heading inside to quickly pick up the pace to follow them.

Jay finally reached the entrance to catch his breath and glanced around the cavern. So many beasts or monsters or even bosses could be in this cave. He didn't know what kind as well. This was no man's land that people don't know about except for him now and this guild he was tailing. One false step, he could die in this game and become part of the Overlord's army. It was something he didn't want to become part of. Taking a deep breath, the auburn slowly ventured in with his sword drawn out, alert and focused.

Everything was quiet around him as he walked his way through the dungeon. Natural light brighten the area from the crevices of the ceiling and water flowed from the waterfalls of the cave walls to keep Jay alerted. Just because he hasn't seen any beasts in this cavern didn't he could let his guard down. Something would be bound to ambush him. He stopped as his eyes caught sight of a few strands of clear rope to walk over to his left and tapped on it to draw his hand back as it felt sticky to his finger. He realized it wasn't rope, but a spider web strand. He chuckled slightly as he figured it was nothing to worry about and continued his way through. He had to get to the metal ingots first before the guild did. If they were facing against any beasts, he could sneak past them while they were distracted.

Unknown of what he done when tapped on the strand, it caused something in the ceiling to move.

Jay made his way more into the dungeon until he came to a large clearing. He grumbled to himself now as he was lost as there were three different paths to take now. He didn't know which one to take as he didn't know which one they took. If he went to each one to retrace his steps, they would have the items and he would be marooned on the island. He had to think now, where would an item be stored in a dungeon on an unknown island. "If I was a pirate hiding my treasure," he mumbled to himself. "I would hide it somewhere where it wouldn't be accessible, but maybe sceneic as well. Like a waterfall of sorts. Yeah that sounds like it." He took a step to listen closely for rushing water, but stopped as he heard something above him.

Something dropped in front of Jay to make his hazel eyes wide at the sight of the large creature. A giant, slender dark blue spider with eight black eyes and fangs with green venom dripping down towered over Jay to screech loudly. Jay screamed loudly to the spider to turn around and flee for the corridor he entered from to only bounce back. He quickly scrambled to his feet to try again to realize a barrier was blocking his way from the exit. Jay felt as if his actual heart outside of the game stopped and turned back to the spider. This beast was the dungeon boss of the game, a name appeared with two HP bars as well. Tiger Widow Spider.

The boss screeched again to charge toward the auburn with nimble speed to make Jay jump out of the barreling speed. It crashed against the wall to turn quick at him and spat out the green venom to make him roll away before it struck him. The vines on the wall that struck by the venom dissolved quickly to make him realize it was a deadly venom. Possibly one touch of it can kill him instantly. He had to be careful, but he had to wonder how to kill this thing now since he was trapped with it. This was something new he had to fight to survive now.

The Tiger Widow Spider screeched again to charge at the auburn as he avoid it and started to attack him with its front legs. Jay avoided the legs from hitting him to trip on his footing to look up as one of its legs was about to impale him to roll away. The leg was stuck in the ground to make Jay have his chance to attack it as it struggled to free itself and charged his weapon. The blade glowed a bright blue aura to shout as he stabbed the abdomen of the spider to make it lose HP and swiped at its trapped leg to slice it off from the spider. The spider screeched loudly in pain to spit more of the venom at him to make him dodge it.

With anger now on missing a leg, the spider charged at Jay to make him not have enough time to react to barrel against him and hit the wall. A groan escaped from the auburn to watch a bit of his HP drain and watched as the spider pin him against the wall to make him scream as it tried to bite him to kick it back and then stabbed it into one of the eight eyes. It retreated back to give Jay time to get back to his feet and get into a proper stance. The spider hissed again to spit again, but this time it wasn't venom it spat out, a ball of spider silk came out and struck Jay to the wall and pinned his arm.

His eyes became wide to struggle against the sticky strands that pinned him like a trapped bug and watched as the spider slowly made its way to him. A whimper escaped from him to struggle harder as it pinned his arm with his sword to keep darting his eyes back and forth as it got closer. Jay quickly charged his blade to slice the strands to free his arm and watched as the spider lunged toward him. He quickly jumped back against the wall to flip over onto the spider's throax. The spider rocked and spun with the auburn clutched on its back tightly. He gripped his weapon tightly as he stabbed into over and over to drain its HP until he finally charged in a dark blue aura and thrust it into the eyes to hear it screech loudly and broke into pieces. And Jay fell to the ground, exhausted.

He finally got up to have a message appear in front of him, congratulating him for defeat the boss to have his HP restored and he even leveled up to laugh lightly. Another message appeared as well, an item from the defeated boss. _A bottle of Tiger Widow Venom, a deadly poison that can kill a boss with ease in the next battle or to paralyze a player in a safe zone or outside._ Jay shrugged as it seemed like an interesting item to keep in tight situations and kept it in his inventory and pulled himself up to watch as the barrier disappeared and he was free to move again. He smiled in relief as he could finally get out of this area and came to one of the corridors to listen closely to have his eyes widen. It was people's voices. The guild's even. This was the path he had to take to quickly head down.

He quickly ducked behind some rocks to see the guild was at the end of the dungeon and watched as Flint was working on the chest. He also watched as the guild was raiding on the other treasures such as gold pieces and items to sell for money and finding weapons. Jay noted that they acted like pirates for sure based on the guild name to make him duck as a couple players walked past him. He sighed quietly and saw that Flint unlocked the chest and pulled out the treasured goods. Awing, Jay saw a bright silver metal ingot in his hands that looked like it had a copper edging on it. This must be the metal he was looking for as they were. The question now was how was he going to get some?

He heard the guild shout in victory on their search. The quest was over now and Jay had to think of a way to grab himself some before they leave. He quickly climbed on the rocky wall to get to higher ground on them to observe his surroundings more. Players were everywhere in the area, the chest was in the center of it to make him groan. This was going to be difficult than he thought. Perhaps he had a better chance to grab some back on the ship where there won't be anyone around in the cargo hold when he hid earlier. That seemed the better chance now.

Before he had a chance to leave, he spun on his heel to stare at the face of one of the guild players that had followed him to quickly draw out his blade. But the guild member quickly swiped the weapon out of his hand to let it fall to the other guild members below and felt a boot to his chest. Jay tripped on his footing and felt gravity take hold to scream a bit as he fell and made contact to the ground to groan. Silence surrounded the area as all the guild members stared at Jay as he picked himself up and gazed around the area to chuckle softly. He quickly grabbed his sword to run off to only feel a round house kick to his chest to fall back down and soon had a sword draw out to his neck. The auburn felt trapped as he had Cyren's serated blade to his throat.

"What have we got here?" the female player wondered. "A stowaway? Not a player from the guild. More a thief then to come this far? Let's see what Nadakhan would say about you then?" Jay gulped again as he didn't like the sound of it.


	10. Nadakhan's Fortress

**Chapter 3: Nadakhan's Fortress**

The waves crashed against the hull of the ship as they headed back to the game's main land of Ninjago Online. A groan escaped from the auburn as he groggily opened his eyes to stare around his surroundings. It definitely wasn't a dream now. Fighting against a giant spider and getting captured by a guild of pirates to be thrown in the ship's brig. Top it off was that they took his weapon away and bound his hands behind his back and gagged him. Not the cruise ship he would enjoy because this. Now his fate rested on the guild's leader when they reach the headquarters. He didn't know what it was, but he would have to wait. And he hated every second of it.

The ship finally stopped to make the auburn perk his head to the noise above him as the guild members were meandering around. His breath hitched as he heard someone coming down the stairs to know they were coming for him to see the scold looks of Cyren and Flint as they unlocked his cell door and grabbed his arms to pull him to his feet. He didn't fight against them as there was just him against an entire guild and merely followed them to the upper deck. Sighing, Jay watched as the guild was disembarking from the ship because they reached shore and it wasn't considered a safe zone. The sun was setting and all knew it was about to be dark for the spawn of the Dark Creature. This meant they had to reach the guild's headquarters now.

Jay was the last to leave the ship as Flint and Cyren dragged him down the ramp and followed them into the woods. He thought about struggling to escape from their grasps and run away, but he was in unknown territory and didn't know where the nearest town was to free himself. So he instead just remained quiet and swallowed his acceptence of a prisoner. He hoped at least they would go easy on him for he was being taken to the leader.

After walking for what felt like an hour, Jay saw the edge of the woods began to clear up with the rays of the sun slowly disappearing in the horizon to feel his virtual heart racing the thought of the Dark Creatures coming soon. But they finally exited from the woods to have the auburn eyes widen to the fortress he saw. Rested on the cliff edge was a fortress that looked like it aged from time, a clear depiction of what the game provided for ancient Ninjago, with a view of the sea as the waves crashed against the cliff walls. Jay figured it was the guild's headquarters as it fit their theme. Pirates, sailing out in the sea for this rare metal, and now this fortress with banners of the guild's emblem on the walls. This was something a guild he has seen unlike other guilds.

The guild have finally reached the entrance of the fortress to enter through the barrier of the safe zone as the sun have finally disappeared. Jay was relieved that they were in a safe zone, but it didn't mean he was in the clear as he was now a prisoner to the guild and still had to meet the leader. The guild went to their separate ways, but Cyren and Flint pulled Jay their way into deeper in the fortress and felt nervous as they came to a set of doors and entered. The room was large and decorated with nautical items and trickets. A large desk rested back against a large set of windows with a set of stairs as well.

Jay felt the back of his knees being kicked to fall down on them and Cyren and Fint holding him down tightly to hear the wood groan above him on the second floor. His breaths quivered as he heard the heavy footsteps reach the stairs and watched as someone was climbing down. From the brightened oil lamps, the auburn saw it was a large, burly man with long raven hair and orange tinted armor and a shawl around his chest. Dark eyes bore into Jay as he studied him and removed the muffler around his mouth to reveal his fu manchu mustache and beard on his chin. Jay no doubt in his mind knew that this was the guild's leader, Nadakhan, he heard about before.

The man studied the teen as he met up to the three and turned to his guild members. "What have you brought in this time?" Nadakhan demanded, to know why they brought a player in. "Was this one you have message me earlier on your voyage back?"

"Yes, Nadakhan," Cyren replied to squeeze Jay's arm to make him wince. "This one here must've overheard on us when we received the location of the metal and became a stowaway on the ship. Now that we captured our would've been thief, we've figured he deserved the honor to meet our leader." She glared at Jay to keep squeezing his arm. "Am I right?" Jay had to nod nervously.

The guild leader studied the teen more to raise a brow on him. Small, thin built, seemed like he wasn't a high level player. But he managed to make it far to stowaway on the ship and unknowingly fought a boss spider on his own to wound up captured. There had to be something unique about this player. "So tell me, player, what is your name?" he wondered as he removed Jay's gag.

Jay remained quiet for a moment to his presense. He was being held captive in the guild's headquarters and was in the room with the guild's leader. He didn't know how he felt at the moment, more like butterflies in his stomach. His virtual heart was racing to calmly take a deep breath. "Jay," he replied, quietly. "My name is Jay."

"And tell me, Jay, what makes you decide to spy on my two second-in-commands and hide on the ship for some rare metal?"

Jay could only gulp to his demanding to know questions. He was spying on them, hid on the ship, fought a giant spider to meet up with the crew to try and steal some metal but wound up captured. This was guilt all over his face. "I was. . ." he stammered. "I was thinking of an invention for my crafting abilities and I needed a more better metal than what I had before." He took a deep breath to collect himself as he was nearing to the part of spying on Cyren and Flint to make them glare at him. "So. . .I saw these two and. . .overheard about the metal to-"

"To the point where you stowaway on the ship, follow us to the treasure room so that you can kill us all for the metal all for yourself." Flint interrupted him.

"What!? No! I wasn't going to kill anyone, except for that Tiger Widow Spider in the dungeon. I was only hoping I'd get a headstart so I could only get a small amount for my project. It had nothing to kill anyone. I don't send people to the Overlord's army."

"You're just saying that to make us feel pity for you." Cyren hissed. "You're nothing, but a wannabe thief so you could have the metal for yourself. You spied on us, followed us to the island, and tried to steal the metal from us."

He had to remain quiet to her statement as it felt like a sinking void in the pit of his stomach. It felt true to him as he thought about it. He did spy on them, followed them to the island, and thought about how to obtain some after Flint open the chest. She was right, Jay was a thief. He didn't reply to only hang his head. Cyren snorted as she had him admit it now. "What should we do with this thief, Nadakhan?" she asked. "Toss him outside and let the Dark Creatures deal with him?"

Jay became tense to the thought of the Dark Creatures. He could tell that Cyren and Flint wanted to get rid of him quickly, but the look in Nadakhan's eyes said otherwise. To which, the man waved his hand aside. "Let's not just jump to hasty conclusions you two." he said, calmly. "I'm sure our little _thief_ here just simply made a mistake after all. Remove his binds and then take him to a cell. I wish to get to know this one a little more." Cyren and Flint glanced each other on his request, but complied to remove the rope around Jay's wrists.

Smiling in relief, Jay brought his hands around to stretch his arms out, but they were immediately grabbed to sigh. At least to him, Nadakhan was showing some pity for him unlike the guild was. The auburn felt himself moving as he was being escorted out to glance over his shoulder as Nadakhan was making his leave and followed with the guild members in the fortress. The three made their way into the lower levels of the fortress that Jay knew were the dungeon cells and pushed him through one of the open cells and locked it behind him. He now stood alone in the small cell after Cyren and Flint left him and sat on the small bed to hang his head and sigh.

He was now prisoner to the Djinn Skybound Pirates, awaiting for his fate. He wondered what Nadakhan meant he wanted to know more about him, but it didn't bother him at the moment. He was marked as a thief by the guild. They probably wanted him dead for trying to steal from _pirates_. All he could do was wait and see what Nadakhan would do to him.


	11. One on One with Nadakhan

**Chapter 4: One on One With Nadakhan**

Quietness was all Jay could hear in his small cell of the guild's dungeon. He was practically the only one in the dungeon. Not another player in sight that wasn't captured by the guild, quite lonely for him. All because of his greed to get some metal that they were looking for and he had to be a part of it. Now he was serving his time in a cell until Nadakhan, the guild's leader, would deal with him. Whatever it was, he wasn't going to enjoy it.

A sigh came from the auburn teen as he sat against the metal door to stare at the moon lit sky from his window to not feel a hint of tiredness hit him. How could one sleep when they were captured as prisoner in both a game and guild jail cell? The first one was what he got used to, but being trapped by a guild was something new. The cell was small with a small straw bed in the corner. Straw littered the stone floor of the dirty cell with a small stool and was only lit by a small candle. Props to Neuro and Cyrus to make a realistic jail cell in the ancient times, but Jay had to wonder if he was in a cell or a barn pen with the straw everywhere.

The large wooden door of the entry way to the dungeon groaned loudly made the teen perk his head and glance over his shoulder. It seemed like a couple hours since he was tossed in, he really haven't checked the time in his menu to know. But the sound of the door meant that someone was coming either to him or to toss another thief into a jail cell. The footsteps grew closer to him with the sound of metal banging against metal as if someone was dragging their weapon against the doors made Jay get up from his spot and watched as Flint came to his door. A look of malice plastered his face as he pulled out the keys to unlock it. "Nadakhan wishes for your audience in his office." he said to pull Jay out and place his hands in shackles.

"Is this necessary though?" Jay grumbled to the shackles. "Not like I'm gonna do anything to you in a safe zone."

"Not taking chances still." the man retorted and grabbed his arm. "Let's go."

Jay had to comply and followed the man out of the dungeon through the complex. He still thought it was a bit too much to have his hands like this, but it wasn't like he was going to attack him. He was following his orders and not resisting arrest. Not like he had a weapon stashed in his menu that they couldn't get to. The only weapon he had was his sword that they took away after capturing him. All he had in his menu were supplies like his crafting stuff and potions for his HP bar and the bottle of Tiger Widow venom, but it was all he had and nothing else.

The two finally arrived to the large doors of Nadakhan's office to have Flint knock on it and pushed it to enter. The large room greeted Jay with the smell of food to feel his stomach churn a bit as he couldn't recall the last time he ate. He saw a small table laid out with food and tea to see Nadakhan and Cyren together to feel nervous as the female player glared at him, but the leader was calm and. . .happy to his presence. This made Jay wonder on why he was being pulled out of his cell to. . .join them for dinner? Yet he was called a thief to the guild. Something felt off.

"Ah Flint," Nadakhan acknowledged. "I see you've brought the guest I've asked for. And yet I see that you handcuffed him when I told you to bring him here unscaved. Remove them at once."

"But sir," the male player began. "He's a thief, we can't take any caution to him, even for you being the leader."

"Did I stutter though?" the leader glared at him. "Remove his shackles at once. I have faith he won't attack us, even during dinner."

Snorting, Flint followed his orders to remove the cuffs around Jay's wrists to make the auburn rub his wrists. Jay was right for one thing though. He was joining them for dinner. It made a knot form in the pit of his stomach though. Having dinner with a guild leader when he was branded as a thief for what he had done recently. This had to be a dream then if this was happening. Normally guild leaders wouldn't want to do anything with a prisoner. Nadakhan, however, was different.

"Good." the leader continued. "Now with that out of the way, Jay, how would you like to join me for dinner for company? We hardly have prisoners and from what I've heard about you, I decided to get to know you more."

"Nadakhan, is that wise though?" Cyren hissed. "We can't trust this player. We captured him because he was going to steal some of the metal from us after he followed us. He's not one to be trustworthy."

"And I've said it before, he's an interesting player from what I've heard from him myself. If you two have a problem with it, then leave and we can have dinner ourselves. He won't do anything reckless and I know it."

The two second-in-commands glared to the auburn haired teen and nodded to their leader to take their leave with the doors closing behind them. Jay stood alone with the guild leader to gulp quietly. He was motioned over to join him at the table to feel frozen to move, but his legs soon made their way to his seat and sat across from him. The smell of the food grew stronger from each breath to feel his virtual stomach growl more to make him wonder if his real stomach outside of the game was starving for real food than what the hospital may be feeding him. He was quiet and saw that Nadakhan was motioning him to take his first pick of the food on the table to nervously fill his plate. Nadakhan followed behind to have both players eat in silence.

After a few minutes of silence, Jay heard Nadakhan clear his throat to lift his eyes from his plate to see he was staring at him. This felt awkward for the auburn to make him wish he was in his cell and fed whatever they would give him. This pampering didn't feel right if he was a prisoner. "So," the leader began. "from what my guild has informed me, I've heard from two sides of this story. With this one on one, I want to hear the more honest truth from you. What exactly was your intention to stowaway on my ship and follow my crew to the island? A lone player like yourself could've gotten killed from the unknown beasts of the island without a guild or team with you."

Jay had to bite his tongue about that statement as it was true. He was a lone player on a remote island from the mainland of the game and defeated a giant spider that could've killed him. All he done was shrug. "I. . .I guess it was just luck to make it far to meet up with your crew on that island." he replied to take a bite of cooked meat. "As for being a stowaway, I accidently overheard on your crew when they were getting information from an informer."

Nadakhan had his brow raised as he listened. "Go on," he insisted.

Jay had to sigh a bit. "Before that happened, I was in my inn room working on a project of mine with the materials I've had. My crafting skills are above average on a player as well as my speed, and my crafted project was created but broke before I could do anything." He took sip from his chalice to clear his throat an recollect himself as he was getting nervous again. "So I decided to take a walk to the park to clear my head and that's when I saw Flint and Cyren. And then I overheard about the rare metal you guys were seeking and the exact one I possibly think was what I needed. From what they say about me, being a thief of any sort, I'm not. I figured I would get a quick advantage to at least get one or two ingots to use for my stuff without anyone notice I was there. But now, I'm here."

The air grew still to have Nadakhan's eyes bore into Jay to make him look away despite he knew his eyes were still trained on him. But the auburn still ate in silence until he heard the man clear his throat and pulled himself out of his seat to head for the large window. Nadakhan gazed at the large moon to observe the activity of his fortress below as his guild meandered on the grounds. "What you say sounds true for me to believe." he said to turn to Jay. "However, I am still on the plea of what my guild has informed me about your thievry. After all, you did admit you spied on my guild, tried to steal some of the metal we needed as well you did for your use." Jay had to purse his lips to feel his virtual heart stammer as it made him guilty.

"A crime that could be punishable. But I want to let you know something." He motioned Jay over to have him comply and stood beside him. "Look below, this is my guild. But the truth is, they too are like you. A thief, player murderer, just like you." Jay had to see how large the guild was than he thought. There was more than a shipful of players. "Cyren and Flint, seemed too overreactive to you than the others. But I wish to offer you a place. Saying a very skilled crafting player could be useful to our ranks."

Jay had to blink to the man's offering. Him, joining a guild? He had never joined a guild before, but what did this man have to offer though?

Nadakhan rested his hand on Jay's shoulder to have him face him. "I'm offering you a place into the guild, be part of the Skybound Pirates, even the lead engineer of the guild as your skills could be of use." the man offered. "But if you wish the deny the offer, I can't possibly let you go. For rejecting, I only send out certain death. By the Dark Creatures, or my crew even, or by my own hands." Jay's eyes were wide to what he said, this man was crazy. No wonder why his crew was large because they accepted his offer. "Don't take long to think of the answer. I'll give you a few hours tonight. By morning, you better have an answer. Cyren, Flint, take our guest back to his cell."

The large wooden doors opened up to have the auburn turn to see the two second-in-commands head toward him and grabbed him by the arms to lead him away. But as they were walking past the table, Jay spotted a butter knife by his place to reach out for it to make them tighten their grip on his arms. But he merely motioned them that he was reaching for a dinner roll to make them agree and grabbed it while carefully and sly slipped the knife into the sleeve of his shirt and walked out with them. Once Jay was back in his cell, he walked to the back of it and waited for the two players to leave until he heard the door to the dungeon shut behind them and removed the knife from his sleeve to toss it onto his bed. He paced around in his cell while eating the last of the roll.

What he did at the table made him like a thief, but for a life and death situation. But this knife was going to be his way out now. He couldn't agree with Nadakhan now, players were forced to join his guild. Not Jay though, he won't be part of it. He had to wait for the right time, he was going to escape and leave this fortress. But not when the Dark Creatures are roaming outside, he had to wait until it was almost morning then he could leave.


	12. Jail Break

**Chapter 5: Jail Break**

Time felt long and tiring to the auburn teen in the small jail cell. A life and death situation was on his life at the moment to have him paranoid. Nadakhan had given him the choice to have him worried. To either join his guild to save his life from execution. Or be executed for rejecting the offer. And from the guild leader had pointed out to him about the guild was that everyone in the guild was like him and was given the same choice. And they chosen life and became part of the large guild than being killed off for the Overlord army. This was something Jay didn't want to be part of.

Jay's hazel eyes were heavy with sleep as he paced around in his small cell while keeping an eye on the night sky. The teen was planning to escape from his cell when the first rays of the sun were in the horizon as he didn't want to fall victim to the Dark Creatures if he escaped out of the complex. But the night was dragging forever to make him fatigue and everytime he shut his eyes, he had to quickly wake up for the fear of sleeping to morning with Nadakhan at his cell door. Or even have Cyren and Flint outside to drag him out of his sleep. Sometimes he figured if he should risk it of escaping his cell and flee into the woods to fend off the creatures. But he kept reminding himself he didn't have a weapon as they took it from him.

A sigh escape from the teen to seat himself on his bed and gaze around in boredom to feel his eyes grow heavy and shook his head to keep himself awake. But it felt hard to in the quietness of the dungeon and darkness, save for the torchlight coming down the hall to light up part of his area. He stifled a yawn to feel sleep overcoming to fall back into his bed and shut his eyes. A surge of panic crossed his body to try and make him open his eyes, but his brain controlling his avatar was claiming victory as it was making him sleep. His brain needed a recharge and it was going to make Jay sleep like outside of the game.

* * *

A startled snort caused the teen to jump up from his sleep. He gazed around in his cell worriedly in fear to rush to his door and glanced around. It was quiet without the sound of anyone approaching to turn to his window to have his hazel eyes widen as he saw the first rays of sunlight in the ocean horizon. It meant that Nadakhan or anyone of the guild members were going retrieve him soon for his choice of joining the guild. It meant he had to escape now or it'll be too late for him.

He quickly grabbed the butter knife he stashed after his dinner with Nadakhan to open his menu to browse his menu to procure a small metal spike he would use as a throwing dagger to then rush to the door. He drew in a deep breath and reached his arms through the bars and inserted both items into his lock to slowly pick at it. His virtual heart was beating with his breath becoming hitched after every sound the complex was making as he figured some of the guild was waking up as well. Time was now becoming less and less for him as he franctically worked at the lock. Finally, a small smile spread on his lips as he heard the lock click and the door swung open.

With him freed from his cell, that was the first phase of the escape plan. The second phase was to survive and escape this complex. And luckily for him was he had see the path of the corridors of the complex from the dungeon to the way to Nadakhan's office. But the rest of the complex was a maze to him. His problem would crashing into any of the guild members or Flint and Cyren on his way out. But another thought came to him since he was freed, he could also grab a couple of the metal ingots that got him captured in the first place. He needed that metal as they did and wondered where they would keep it. For being pirates, they most likely stored it in a treasure room.

With it in mind, the auburn had a plan now and made his way out of the dungeon to catiously glance around the corridor and made his way through. His brow was raised in curiousity as it was quiet and deserted. He thought there would be guard at least, but there was nobody around. He shrugged as it didn't matter right now and quickly turned the corner, but felt his body collide with somebody else to fall to the floor. He picked himself to give out a small shriek as he collided into Flint to receive his glare.

"How did you manage to escape!?" the man shouted to draw out his sword and made his way to Jay. The auburn slowly stepped back in fear until he felt his back against the wall. The tip of the sword was at his chest to make him gulp into the man's blazing eyes. "We knew we should've dealt with you before bringing you here. Should've killed you off. Wait until Nadakhan hears about you, until I deal some damage on you to teach you in your place." He raised the sword to slash it toward him.

Feeling instincts kicking in, Jay dodged out of the way from the sword to roll to the side. He watched Flint turn on his heels to swing the sword at him again to dodge the blade again and again. If this was actually IRL to the auburn, he would have adrenaline pumping in his veins. Jay felt his back up against the wall again to see a torch hanging next to him and quickly grabbed it to parry the man's attack. With him stunned, Jay quickly struck the torch at the man's head to have him fall to the floor with his sword clattering to the floor. With the idea of having a sword as a better weapon, Jay quickly grabbed it until Flint jumped to his feet and lunged for Jay. A small shriek escape from the teen and held the sword up to defend himself and heard the man yelp in pain to see he had stabbed him with his own sword and was on the floor.

Jay took a step to try and help him, but instead turn to run. It was best for him than to help him for the fear of being beaten and locked up again. Unknown to Jay, Flint had his menu open to send a message to every guild member that he was escaping.

His footsteps were loud as he raced through the corridors to find his way to the treasure room. The sword was gripped tightly as he ran, being cautious in his surroundings. It may be dark still with morning coming, but it didn't mean that there was more player meandering around for him to collide with like Flint. A loud shriek made the auburn stop in his tracks to see Cyren above him to jump out of the way. He saw the fire in her eyes as she charged for him to dodge her cutlass blades and parried her blades.

"Look we can talk about this!" Jay pleaded as he fought against her. "I am not wanting to do this, but I just want to leave and will never bother you again."

"It doesn't matter. Not when it comes to Nadakhan." the female player shouted. "No one leaves the guild." Their swords crossed and forced Jay against the wall. Jay struggled against her to plant his foot on her chest and kicked her back to have her stumble back and took off running with her right behind him. "Get back here!"

Jay glanced over his shoulder to see the woman right behind him to quickly turn the corner of another corridor to a dead end and saw an open window ahead to run to it and peered through it. The drop was life threating and dark that he couldn't see around it. He glanced around to see the walls of stone looked like he could climb it and turned to see Cyren was closing on him to climb over the ledge and began to climb to hear her swords hit stone from where he was. His heart was racing as he saw the woman glare at him from the window to keep climbing and watched her retreat back to find a way to cut him off. The auburn continued climbing to feel his arms become sore and saw another window to climb to it and was glad it wasn't locked to push it open and climbed in to sigh.

The room was dark and quiet and wondered how much time he had before Cyren and Flint or the entire guild was closing in on him. But from the darkness, Jay figured he was in a room that could provide him a lot of cover to hide in just in case. But he wondered where was in exactly to open his menu to pull out a small latern and made his way to the torches on the wall. After the last one was lit, Jay turned to have his jaw dropped to what the room was. Weapons, armor, gold coins, metal ingots littered the floor and walls to have him marvel around the room as he walked around. He had found it. The treasure room that he was looking for that might be housing the metal ingot he needed. He quickly got into focus mode to search around for the special metal, thankful he had seen it before being captured.

As he was searching around, Jay stopped as he saw a spear in a glass case to raise a brow as he studied it. A blue staff with two lightning bolts formed into the spearhead to shrug at it and had his eyes squint past the glass to see a familiar glint. Silver metal with copper ore along the sides of it, he had found it. The metal from Tiger Widow Island. He quickly rushed to it grab a ingot to study and examined to see it didn't have an name for it, but the stats of it bewildered him to quickly put it into his inventory and turned to leave. But he stopped to turn at the pile to feel temptation claw him to grab another ingot and then a third. As he was grabbing for a fourth, a knife struck next to his hand to yelp and turned to see Nadakhan behind him.

Jay's heart was racing to see the anger and hatred in the man's dark eyes to watch as he drew out his scimar sword to gulp and held Flint's sword out. If this was his last stand, may as well be against Nadakhan than anyone else. He was going have to fight his way out then.


	13. Life or Death in the Guild

**Chapter 6: Life or Death in the Guild**

His heart was pounding with his breathing quicking. His hazel eyes were wide with fear as he stared into the dark eyes of hatred. He had found the metal he was hoping to have as his own earlier before the ordeal of being taken prisoner. But now that he had found it in the treasure room of the guild headquarters, there was only thing remaining in his path of escape. Nadakhan had him cornered in the room with his sword drawn. All Jay had was his stolen sword and full of fear against the ruthless guild leader.

Nadakhan gazed at the teen in front of him standing over the pile of metal ingots with the sword he recognized as Flint's. He now saw it from what Flint and Cyren had told earlier when they captured him. He was now a thief based on Flint's sword and witnessing him taking some of the ingots. He had escaped from his cell somehow, but that was beside the point. Nadakhan didn't have to wait on his decision now. Jay's choice of the guild was death now.

"So, you've chosen death." the leader chasisted. "And it's no exception to talk your way out of it. Very well, I'll deal with you myself and drag you out to the Dark Creature to kill your avatar."

Jay only gulped to the threat. He was right, there would be no exception to talk his way out of it. They both stood alone and he figured that Flint and Cyren were waiting outside to let Nadakhan have at him. "I can't be part of this guild." he said, quietly. "This doesn't seem right to be. . .a thief among thieves." He glanced around the room to see the latern burning with the oil and the window he climbed in from to have an idea form for an escape route. He cautiously walked around while keeping his eye on the leader. "But. . .I'm sure we can do this civilly and not kill each other. We are in a safe zone after all."

"Maybe so." the man agreed. "But it doesn't mean I can't still inflict pain to you. You've made the choice to not be part of the crew, so there's punishment."

"And-and I understand. But I'm not afraid of a beating or anything, maybe we can settle this with. . .checkers or something." Jay saw he was close to the window and the latern to drawn in a deep breath. "But. . .I don't really have the time for such." He quickly grabbed the latern to throw it at the guild leader to spread the oil on the floor and made a run for the window.

As he made it close to his escape, a strong hand grabbed him by the throat to have Jay struggle against Nadakhan's strong grip as he lifted him off the floor. Nadakhan's dark eyes bore into Jay to snort. "Aye, but I have time for you." he said and threw Jay to the other side of the room.

The auburn felt the air blown past his body and soon felt his back made contact to the glass case that housed the spear to fall to the floor. A groan escaped from his throat as he lifted his head to see the man across from him and slowly pulled himself to one knee. So much for escaping as he saw him like an open book now with the fire dying down from his earlier attempt. His only way now was to fight him to escape. He gazed at his hands to realize the sword was missing now and looked at the ground. The spear that was in the case now laid on the floor next to him and quickly snatched it to get back on his feet. He held the weapon with both hands to feel awkward with them at first, but they soon felt comfortable to surprise him. He never held a spear before, but this spear felt like it was made for him to take a stance.

A chuckle escaped from the man as he held the spear in his hands to grip his sword tightly. By his stance, he could see that Jay never held that kind of weapon before. Seemed like an easy victory for him. He charged to the teen with his blade glowing a bright orange aura and thrust toward his chest. But a quick blue light blocked his attack to become stunned as Jay had block the tip of the sword with the spearhead. The auburn quickly pushed the sword away to twist the weapon across his back and have the shaft made contact to his face to stumble back. He shook his stun away to become astonished of how quick he stopped his attack and expertly move the weapon around his body. Even Jay was surprised to what he done to chuckle lightly at the spear in his hands.

A growl escaped from the man to charge back to the teen to swing the sword with another charged aura attack to have it parried and twist his body to land another strike. But Jay parried both attacks to have the spear roll across his shoulders to grab it and strike at his legs to spin his body and spear. The spear glowed a bright blue aura as Jay focused his charge and thrust it at Nadakhan's chest to launch the man back to the far side of the room. The auburn laughed a little to the dazed man. "I guess I don't need a sword after all, Nadakhan." he remarked. "A spear is much better against a brute like you."

Shaking his daze away, Nadakhan slowly pulled himself to his feet to study the teen once more. He had to take back on what he thought earlier about his ability with a spear. He was an expert somehow. But with every player that wielded a weapon, there were bound to be weak points on them. Jay was quick, like he could see the attacks before they struck to parry them with the spear. But that was in the front, what about from the back when he would twist his body? "I'm not giving up just yet, boy." he grumbled to run toward him again.

A sigh came from Jay to the same tactic to grip the spear tightly and wait for him to charge to stop the blade from striking. He struggled to push back the man until he used all the strength he could muster to dislodge both weapons and lashed a kick to his unprotected chest. But that caused him to lose his guard as Nadakhan threw a punch to his jaw to have him turn his back on him. A gasp came from the auburn to have his hazel eyes travel down his chest as he saw Nadakhan's sword through him and a strong kick to land into a heap on the floor.

Pain radiated Jay's body, thankful though as his HP bar wasn't being effected by the safe zone, to try and pull himself up. The wound on his chest was going to remain there for some time and glanced at the guild leader. He was a pirate, full of tricks like most. He glanced around to see where he was to noticed a stone platform in the far corner that had ancient Ninjago inscriptions around it. He had seen something like before when reading books in villages when he first started playing. They were teleportation pads that allowed players to teleport anywhere safely. Instead of a window, he could use that , but he had to deal with Nadakhan still. But he quickly remembered something to open his menu and search for it until a small vial landed in his hand.

The Tiger Widow Venom he received back on Tiger Widow Island. A poison that could quickly kill any enemy, but can paralyze a player in a safe zone for one use. His ticket to finally escape from Nadakhan's grasp. Quickly removing the cork, Jay applied the venom onto the spearhead as he watched the man come up to him. With it applied, Jay quickly got back to his feet and charged. As he got closer, he stopped to place the shaft end on the floor to vault toward the man and landed a strong kick to his chest and kicked upward to push his sword out of the way. Once Jay landed, he quickly thrusted the spear into the leader's chest to hear him grunt and slump to his knees.

A small chuckle escaped from the man to lift his head at him while shaking his head. "What's the reason to stab me for?" he questioned him. "After all, I stabbed you, yet you're fine because we're in a safe zone."

Jay smirked. "What's the reason to not stab you with a reason after all?"

A choked gasp escaped from the man to feel his avatar body become frozen to move and struggled to lift his arms. He glanced at his HP bar to notice an icon next to it to have his dark eyes widen. A paralysis icon. Jay removed the spear from his chest to grunt on the pain to snarl as the auburn teen slowly backed away from him. "You think this will stop me!?" he shouted. "When this poison wears off, you'll be hunted by every player on this game! No one leaves the guild from my grasp! Nobody!"

Jay kept his glare on him as he made his way to the teleportation pad. Nadakhan may have made his point about him, but it didn't stop him from leaving. "Watch me then." he growled, lowly. He stepped onto the pad to watch as the door flew open with Flint and Cyren rushing in toward him. "Teleport! Sea of Sands!" A bright blue aura surrounded the teen to find himself in a new area, away from Nadakhan and his guild. The teleportation caused him to lose his footing and roughly landed on his back in the new territory to glance around on where he was. High dunes of sand, unbearable heat, barren land around him; ideal place for a guild to not find him for they could spawn anywhere.

A sigh of relief brushed across Jay's face as he felt the sand dust his cheeks as he gazed around. He gripped his spear tightly to feel a scabbarb spawn onto his back and holstered it into place. Once secured, he took another deep breath to gaze around more. "Okay. . .Which way is the nearest town from here?"


	14. The Bounty

**Chapter 7: The Bounty**

Long, taut fingers wove together as the teen was slowly and carefully merging all of the items together in his hands. His high crafting skills brought a small smile on his face as he watched the items accept each other to have the inn room fill up in a bright light. He shielded his eyes away from the light until it died down and his smile grew wider to his crafted gadget. A small black box with two small triggers on the side and two small metal barbs jutting out of the end. Jay was ecstatic that it all held together and carefully grabbed it to examine it.

He gently brushed his fingers along the metal casing to smile on his achievement and opened the menu to view its stats. When reading about, he had figured that this device wasn't meant for killing creatures to player, more for stunning them with a high electric current. A homemade taser. He did frown a bit that he could only use it for three times before it breaks apart of it usefulness; more for an emergency escape like Nadakhan and the poison he used. But he did still have plenty of the metal ingots he. . .stolen from the guild. He was a true thief now.

A small yawn escape from the teen after his crafting work to store his taser into his inventory and stretched himself in his chair. He gazed out of the window to noticed that it was getting dark outside to check the time; half past eight. Soon Jay felt his stomach churn in hunger to chuckle a bit, crafting half of the day could make a person hungry after all as his father had told him before outside of the game. "Better get a bite to eat before the shops close for the night." he mumbled to himself and pulled himself out of his chair. He quickly opened his menu to don onto his armor and made sure his spear was secured to his back to feel that same smile form on his face. Since the escape from the fortress, the spear had been practically his lifesaver in tough situations and he felt more confidences into surviving the game than the old sword he had.

The cool night of the small village Jay found himself in was quiet and peaceful as he strolled down the roads to examine his surroundings. It reminded him of the other town he was in before spying on Flint and Cyren when they were getting their information about Tiger Widow Island. But he knew he wouldn't see any pirates, this town was thriving with many players than before to make him not see any of the guilds. There were street performances happening around with players performing acts to entertain spectators. Children players playing games with one another as they ran down the roads in games of races or tag. There was even a drama play happening over at the outdoor auditorium down a level of the village. Despite that players were trapped in the game by the virus, they were still finding ways to feel. . .alive to forget about their imprisonment. It made Jay smile to see a second life happening without any player dying for the Overlord's army.

As the auburn teen continued to head for any shops still open, he had to pause and walked back to a notice board as something caught his attention. The notice board was where players would receive information about the newsletter of the game from player victories to deaths, to locations of high amounts of treasure, but also about bounties on other players. A weathered poster hung on a nail on the board with a drawn face of a teen with short hair and a vertical scar over his right eyebrow; an image of him. But what stunned Jay more was that it wasn't just a drawn picture of him, but it was a bounty. _Wanted: Captured Alive. Bounty: Three Million Gold._ Jay could only blink, Nadakhan placed the bounty on his head. "He wasn't kidding then." he sighed.

Glancing around, Jay quickly removed the poster from the board and stored it into his inventory. With a high populated village, he didn't want to take any risks now. Some players may have already seen it, bounty hunters no doubt were being called for to hunt him down, everyone else in this village will never see this poster. Jay was marked as a thief now, will have to watch over his back now. Become a ghost, try to blend in and hide away from his bounty. But he knew for sure was that Nadakhan and his guild will never find him, no matter how hard they'll try.

This was Jay's true test of survival of the game.


	15. Guide

**Hey everyone, Packerfan95 here, and I'm back after a long hiatus wait. Been busy to ever make another set of chapters for this progressive story. But now that I'm back here, I can continue to post more of this story and finish it all and move onto other stories I wish to make. Anyway, let's move onto the next ninja, the Master of Earth, Cole.**

* * *

 **Cole**

 **Chapter 1: Guide**

The movement of miniscule stones brushed across the rocky terrain as a hand moved onto the crevice. A small grunt escaped from a teen as he pulled himself up to climb more. Above him was the ledge for him to reach. Below him was the deadliest fall in which one slip could let him fall and become part of the Overlord's army. Of all places in the game, this teen found himself secluded into the mountains to rock climb and battle against creatures to level up. But of course he had to make it back to the mountain village near him before dusk to not fall victim to the Dark Creatures. This was the life style of Cole in Ninjago Online.

A final grunt escape from the teen as he pulled himself over the ledge and rolled onto his back to sigh in relief as the climb was over. He wondered if he became mentally exhausted for his brain through his NeuroGear as he laid on the ground not breathing heavily as he would in IRL. He just laid there, his avatar body feeling tired from the climb and staring at the virtual sky. _Another cloudless day,_ he thought to himself. _Perfect for a climb for sure you say. And yet you feel like you're not getting anywhere in this game._

That made the teen sigh as he pulled himself up to stare at the mountains around him. Ever since the day the virus took control, Cole made his way to the mountains as he figured most players wouldn't come here to train and conquest their way to defeat the virus. The mountains were filled with creatures that many players weren't aware of and many could be lost in the mountains if not careful enough. But unlike Cole, he knew every path of the mountains and what kind of creatures there were. But with this knowledge, he still felt something in him that made him think he wasn't getting far in the game. It made him sigh again and glanced around to noticed the sun was starting to set. _Another day to come and go._ he muttered. _Better get back before they come out._ He stared at the ledge to begin his climb back down.

* * *

The small bell shop chimed as the door swung open to ring as a player entered into the small tavern. Cole lifted his eyes from his plate to see who entered to noticed it was a lone player with short, snow white hair with dark eyes dressed in heavy armor on his chest with a katana strapped his back. The player was alone than with a guild to make the teen snort and turn his attention to the window as he watched the last of the virtual sun rays leave the mountain horizon. Lone players tend to be troublesome players than those in a guild, he knew better not to get involve if anyone started something. He would rather eat his meal to calm the gwaning feel of his stomach to make his brain think he was full and renew his energy for tomorrow's expedition.

Unknown to him, the snow haired player meandered around the tavern, talking to the others players to have him pointed to Cole's direction to make his way toward him. He pulled the other chair out to take a seat and rest his feet onto the table. Cole had to give him a glare for his rudeness. "You know this table is taken, right?" he stated to grab his plate to continue eating.

"Oh don't mind me," the player chuckled. "But I've heard that you're a well known player in these mountains. Like you know every path well and know where the dangers are and stuff."

Cole had to raise a brow to him on how he would know that. This player didn't look like he was from around these mountains in the game. If anything, he had to guess this player came from the main ground and major cities of the game based on his armor and sword. But it was true to what he said, he did know every path and where to avoid foes in the mountains. "I guess it depends then." he said, taking another bite. "Who's asking?"

The snow haired player removed his boots off the table to lean over to Cole. "Listen, I'm in need of an escort. I run a guild here who's on a quest for a rare item and it's somewhere here in the mountains. However, we don't know exactly where and that's why I'm here. I've been searching for someone here who can help us. And whatever treasure we find along with the rare item, you get fifteen percent of the cut."

Snorting, Cole had to roll his eyes and set his plate back down. That was all he wanted, an escort to find a quest item. Something that he wasn't part of to bother accepting. "Look, even if it was a rare item, the dungeon couldn't possibly be hidden on your quest log. I'm sure looking at your map can't hurt you on this quest though."

"Ah but you're mistaken however." the playered stated to open his menu and showed him the map. Cole studied it to see the village they were in and a highlighted area of the quest log of his. But from studying it, he realized there was no exact position of the dungeon. And Cole knew where a few dungeons in the mountains were, but not around this area it was highlighted. "Do I have your interest now? You see, this quest of ours is hidden and no one better on this area must be you. I've asked others players in this village, but none of them got my interest. Until I found you. And better yet, I'll make your cut twenty percent if you help us tomorrow and get it before the Dark Creatures come out the next night. So do you say?"

It sounded. . .intriguing for the teen almost. A twenty percent of profit in aiding this quest could help him gain some money for better items. The problem though was that he didn't know him much or why seek him out of many other players. And if it was just him, where was the rest of the guild then? But a thought crossed his mind from earlier in the day when he wondered where the game was leading him instead of the mountains. Maybe being his guide would help him understand a better purpose for his part in the game. It's been three months since the imprisonment of all Ninjago Online players, he seemed like it was time to move on and do something else in the game.

Shrugging, Cole held his hand out to the player. "Alright, I accept the offer." he said. "We'll leave as soon as the Dark Creatures despawn to meet up with your guild and you follow my lead and don't wander off. Got it?"

The player smiled to grab his hand and shook it to agree on the terms. He knew he would agree to his offer. "Sounds like a well thought plan." he said. "The name is Yan. And I'll see you tomorrow then. He got up from his chair and left the tavern.


	16. Tricked

**Chapter 2: Tricked**

The virtual sun was rising in the mountain horizon and beating on Cole's back as he climbed on the side of the mountain. It always amazed him that the NeuroGear had given him temperature effects and other senses as if it was his real body climbing on the mountain. Feeling the heat of the sun to the chilly nights in the mountain village. The gust of the winds to the feeling of the virtual water as if it was real. The creation of the NeuroGear from Neuro was a revolution in technology with Cyrus and his company.

Climbing next to Cole was the player that had hired him to guide him and his guild across the mountains for a quest as he stated that he knew the mountains more than any other player. The snow white haired player was Yan and followed closely beside the raven haired teen as they reached closer to the ledge. It puzzled Cole at first on where Yan's guild was as he thought he was meeting them in the village. But instead, it was only Yan in the square and just followed after the player into the mountains. Where was his guild then? Hopefully a safe zone in the mountains then or another village to ensure they didn't get attacked by any of the Dark Creatures.

The ledge was within reach for the teen to grab onto and pulled himself up. But the ledge around his grip broke off to feel gravity take hold of his body as he fell back. A quick hand reached down and grabbed Cole's arm to see himself hang over the mountain. Yan smiled at the teen and pulled him back up to let Cole sigh in relief. "Thanks for that." he said to jump back to his feet. "Nice reflexes there."

"It's nothing." the snow white haired player shrugged. "Reflexes tend to develop over time in the game to ensure you don't die. Or others especially my guide. Let's keep moving, we're almost at the quest area." He lead the way to leave Cole a bit puzzled.

He watched as the other walk ahead to nod and followed after him. He was his guide to find this quest dungeon and he was getting paid for it. Of course Yan wouldn't want him killed off without knowing the way into the dungeon. "Speaking of which, I've had this question all morning since we started this trip." he said. "Where exactly is the rest of the guild? I thought they would be with you when we met up this morning. But it's just us and I haven't seen anyone else."

The other player glanced over his shoulder to Cole to look back and kept walking. Cole didn't appreciate the cold shoulder though. "They are already at the area because we found a safe zone area nearby." he replied. "Sending me to seek a guide, being you. So nothing to worry about, they were safe last night from the Dark Creatures."

Cole nodded to that and saw a clearing ahead to quicken his pace until both reached the clearing. The two players stood on the ledge that overlooked clearing to have Cole count twelve more players below them. It surprised the raven haired teen that he had a large guild as there wasn't a limit to the amount of players can be in a guild. And he was a guide to them to feel a bit nervous of leading a large group. A lot of weight on his shoulders to lead them to the dungeon location and through it alive without dying for the Overlord Virus.

"Let's get a move on now," Yan suggested to lead him down the steep pathway. Cole followed next to him to head toward the group, but the other player simply pulled him away to head for the surrounding mountain. "Let's skip introductions right now for we're on a rush before other guilds take on this quest and get the treasure before us."

Puzzled, Cole had to look at him uncertain to his motives to pull him away as such. It seemed rude to not introduce himself to the guild and lay out any ground rules to ensure no one gets killed during the expedition. He glanced over his shoulder to notice that six members of the guild had the look of determination and sneer looks as well. The other half had the looks of nervousness and worry plastered on their face a little. But it didn't look like it was toward the mountains, they were looking toward him more. This raised a little tension that he couldn't fathom on. "All right then," he said to pull up his menu to his map and glanced at Yan's quest map to pinpoint their location and the clues it was providing for the entrance.

His mind was focused on the clues it provided as the clearing they were in was the starting location. But the clues didn't provide enough detail. "Of the three peaks, the sun rides the mountain side, by nightfall the entrance reveals itself." he recited over and over and glanced around the mountains peaks around them, but none seemed there was three next to each other that stood out. Something was missing to him. "Did this quest provided anything else that you forgot to mention? Like a key or something?"

Yan glanced away to think to shrug and opened his menu to browse his inventory. "Well other than the clues, it also provided us this medallion." he replied to have an object appear in his palm. A golden medallion rested in his palm with three holes bored into the shiny metal etched with ancient Ninjago writing. "We thought that maybe it was a compass or something, but it seemed useless and was about to toss it out."

The glint of the metal caught his eyes as he stared at it for a couple minutes to peer closer to it. Other than the writing on the edges of it, his eyes were trained on the three holes and lines that jutted underneath them. They seemed important on a medallion, even for a quest item. And the more he stared at it, the more the clues recited in his head. _Of the three peaks, the sun rides the mountain side, by nightfall the entrance reveals itself._ He turned to the mountains where the sun was to have it dawn onto him. "That's because it is a compass." he replied to snatch it from Yan's hand and held it out in front of him to the sun. He stared through the holes to match them at three mountain peaks that aligned them together and followed his eyes to where the sun would descend. "That's the one!" he exclaimed to point at the mountain peak. "The entrance wasn't here, it's over there." He pulled out his map and pinged the location and handed Yan the medallion back.

A smile crept on the snow haired player's face to turn to his guild. "Let's move out," he ordered. "We need to reach it there by nightfall or the Dark Creatures will spawn." He heard half of his guild respond and turned to Cole to rest his hand on his shoulder. "Lead the way then." He saw Cole nod and followed next to him.

* * *

The path to the dungeon seemed more than what Cole bargained for. A couple times on the mountain path, they encountered monsters of the mountains to a giant rock golem, but luckily they avoided that one because they were unmatched for it. Now the twelve guild members and Yan followed behind him as they walked on the steep path toward the mountain peak as the sun was slowly dipping from the sky. Soon it was going to be nightfall and the Dark Creatures were going to spawn and kill them with ease. But Cole's map told them that they were close to the marked location, so they wouldn't have to worry about them spawning. Once they entered the dungeon, they'll have to deal with the dungeon monsters, but they won't be as hard as the Dark Creatures. So it'll be a sigh of relief. But on the journey to the dungeon, Cole couldn't keep his mind off on the half of the guild that was nervous. Not once had he heard them speak at all, nor the other half. Everyone was silent the entire way through.

The peak was growing closer and closer to the teen and finally came across a clearing to rush ahead to have his eyes widen to what he saw. In front of the teen wasn't what he thought what would be a dungeon, a temple monastery rested into the mountain side with towering wooden red pillars and slanted tiled roof. This was the quest location, his map was showing the location he marked and it was nothing else that stood out discreetly. Yan caught up with the raven haired teen to smile at the sight of the temple to pat his shoulder and continued moving toward the door. "Nice work, Cole." he said and came to the door. "Now I guess we wait since it said that at nightfall the entrance will unlock."

"Same thing I was thinking." Cole agreed and watched as the sun was leaving the horizon. It seemed like nightfall was approaching closer. He walked up to the wooden door to study it to wonder how nightfall was going to open the door. It was probably a coded algorithm in the game for the time it was set to open the door every time. Because he couldn't find a key hole or anything, just a solid door that wouldn't move even when trying open it himself. The best was to wait then he figured.

An hour finally passed and the last of the sun rays finally left the mountain peaks to coat the sky in its dark colors with the stars and crescent moon glistening. The sound of wood groaning caught Cole's attention to turn his head to the wooden doors as they slowly swung open. He watched as Yan's guild began to walk in and followed after them. Torches lit up around them as they slowly entered to glance around. The inside of the temple was barren, sand littered on the stone floor, all there was was a hole in the center of the room to have Cole move over to it. He carefully peered in to see nothing but darkness and a ladder that lead down to it. It was a dungeon after all, the only way in was going down.

A strong kick to the back surprised the raven haired teen to feel his body fall foward to the ground to scream as he plunged into the darkness. A couple seconds later, he felt his shoulder meet solid ground to groan and rolled on his back to stare at the hole he was kicked into to hear people shouting and pleading to watch six more players shoved into the hole. All met with him at the bottom to have Cole panic a bit as it was the six players that were nervous since the beginning of the quest and turned back to see Yan and his other six smirking from above them. Something was wrong. "What was that for, Yan!?" he shouted. "You can't toss your guild like that! They're people too."

A hearty chuckle escaped from the snow haired player with his guild laughing with him. This made Cole nervous a bit. "Who said they were part of my guild?" he retorted. "No. They were just lackeys we kidnapped to take the damage for us as they lead us through the dungeon. Along with you of course, Cole Brookstone." Cole froze a bit, how did this player know his IRL name? "And yes I know who you are. My name isn't Yan by the way, it's Yang. Doesn't that name sound familiar now to you? And you easily fell for the bait. Tricked. How does that feel to you? Now let's get moving, if you ever try to escape or kill us, we'll kill you for treason. Now find us that quest treasure."

Cole could only growl in anger to this. A trap all laid out and he fell for it. Now his life was on the line along with six others. And this guild was going to them as rats for the dungeon and traps. He was right in the beginning, they were forced to be silent to not warn him of the danger he was facing and leading them to their deaths. Now he was stuck at the state. There had to be a way to escape this unscathed. Yang was going to escape with this, the death of innocent players at the end of the quest.


	17. Into the Dungeons

**Chapter 3: Into the Dungeons**

Anger blossumed in Cole's chest as he lead the six captured players behind him through the caverns of the dungeons. And on top of that, Yan's-. . .Yang's guild was closely behind, ensuring that the seven of the prisoner of players took the blunt of the traps that the dungeon would have set. To monsters, bosses no doubt, and hidden traps that would kill unsuspecting players if not taking a careful step. Cole was a guide still, a guide to players' deaths if he wasn't careful. Or to ensure Yang's guild doesn't kill them for wasting their time.

Cole knew from the start that he should've expected something was wrong from the start when he first came to the clearing that had Yang's guild and the trapped ones. They were silent, threatened if they tried to warn him no doubt. And Yang's personality should've made him more suspicious. Silent as well, quick to the point, convincing even to have the teen fall into his trap. And Cole couldn't believe that he fell victim to it all. The same thing must've happened to the guild as well. All trapped like a bug on a spider web.

Yang, Cole knew that name from anywhere in IRL. A past of his and Yang had resurfaced from it. Now they were both in the game and he had found him. Something that-

"So what happened to you to fall victim of the guild?" one of the trapped players asked. The raven haired teen glanced over his shoulder to make eye contact to a player with black hair with blue highlights around the edges to see he was smiling sheepishly at him. He could see that player was nervous since he was being threatened for his life in the game. "What happened to you to fall into their trapped?"

A sigh came from Cole to glance back and kept walking. Normally he wasn't one for small talk but he needed to focus to be aware for traps if they weren't careful. He heard the player sigh quietly and glanced to see the player's eyes drift away from him. He shouldn't be the one giving them the cold shoulder, for he was the same in their predicament. "He needed a guide to get them to the mountians with the promise of high payment with whatever was in the dungeon after they get the quest treasure." he replied. "But it looks like that isn't going to happen at the end. Once they're done with this quest, we're done for. Just slaves to keep them alive, and I fell victim to it. Your guild then?"

A sigh came from the player to glance at his teammates to see them nod to him. "We were a guild before they came." he replied. Cole glanced at him to what he meant. They were a guild before? "I am Dustin, people call me Dust for short, and we were the guild known as the Midnight Knights and I was their second-in-command. We were travelling through the mountains to reach the next village and level up along the way until we were ambushed by them. Yang demanded us to surrender to them, our leader Trex refused to do so, but Yang killed him and we lost our guild just like that. Since then, we've been slaves to take the falls for monsters and rob other players for them."

Cole was struck to what he heard. He knew Yang was ruthless in IRL, somehow he didn't change at all when entering the game. And now this guild and him were now trapped by this guy. "I'm sorry to hear that." he said, quietly. "Your leader had real guts to stand up against this guy. But in the end to die by him." Dust had to nod to his statement as it was true.

"There's something you seem to know then about him?" another player questioned. Cole glanced to the player to see he was a stocky player with broad shoulders, long shaggy hair, and stubble on his jawline. "The way he talked to you when he revealed himself shows that you have a history in the game. Or IRL for that matter. So what is it that you're hiding?"

"Zip it, Mac." Dust exclaimed. "It's none of your business if he doesn't want to talk about it."

"Nono, he's right." Cole stated. "Yang and I do have a little history together, something I thought I wouldn't have to deal with again." He took a deep breath to sigh through his nose. "Outside the game I live in the suburban area outside of Ninjago City because my dad is the well known quartet singer called the Royal Blacksmiths. So with him, he tried to have me follow his footsteps and I wasn't about that. That's when I crossed Yang."

"Yang was well known in the school for he bullied a lot of freshmen and he used to target me because everyone knew me about my dad, called me spoiled brat because I could get anything I wanted. But I was never liked that, and when I stood up against him to defend myself, he would punch me in the gut to fall. Finally I had enough of him, found him on the grounds picking on a freshman, slugged him in the jaw. Instead of fighting, he said he liked my style realizing I wasn't a brat. So. . .he asked me to join his gang and his voice convinced me to. Like it did to this trap."

Dust was in awe to his past. "So Yang was manipulative in IRL like he is here?" he said.

"Exactly. Since then, I followed under his command. Doing things I didn't want to though, beating freshmen in school, taking the blame to get an in school suspension. My dad wasn't happy with me with this path I had and I convinced him it wasn't who I was. I told him that I would find a way to leave. And I did, a month after I joined, I started dating his sister Yin because she had a crush on me. But when he found out, he threatened me to back off from her and I threw the first punch. He told his gang to back off as he wanted to fight me. Eventually I won the fight and they backed off. And I had a hidden camera record everything about their parts with the fights in the school to me taking their blames and gave it to the principal. Since then, we haven't heard from them because they were expelled. I stopped an annoying gang of bullies from the school."

Silence hung in the air around the teen and prisoned players after his story. His history of him and Yang. And he felt better once he released the pent annoyance he had when being trapped by him again. Now they all knew what he was hiding. "Sounds cliche when you say it." Mac retorted. "If anything, it sounds like he wants revenge and now we're going to take the blows because of you."

"Maybe so," the raven haired teen agreed. "But we can worry about it later, right now we can focus on a plan to ensure we don't die by their hands. And I can grantee your safety from this dungeon and guild if you just work with me."

A snort came from stocky player to nudge Cole aside to take the lead. He wasn't in the mood to listen to him and rather find a way from the guild. "I don't have time for this, they can try and kill us all they want." he said. "We may not have Trex, it doesn't mean we're weak, we're still a guild and I will not die here today." He felt a hand grab the back of his shirt to make him stop in his tracks abruptly. Metal spikes rose from the floor inches from his nose to have his eyes widen and his breath quivering to his impending death to glance over his shoulder to see Cole was the one who stopped him before walking into the trap.

Cole calmly released his grip on Mac's shirt to nudge his foot off the platform he stepped on. The spikes retracted back into the floor and Cole carefully walked down while telling them to step back until he reached the other side. He pulled a metal chain to hear a click as he deactivated the trap and motioned everyone to pass through. Once both parties of guild crossed safely, the raven haired teen made his back front and looked at Mac with a malice look. "Stick with me," he hissed. "I'll make sure you won't die in this game." He watched him nod to agree. "Good. Let's keep moving." He continued leading the way, unknown that Yang was smirking behind his back.


	18. Separation

**Chapter 4: Separation**

It felt like an eternity as the raven haired teen lead the players through the dungeons. Through and through, Cole and the once known guild Midnight Knights have disarmed many of the unknown traps and fought against the beasts that spawn in the game while Yang and his guild only forced and watched as they did the work. Not lifting the finger to help them, Yang only had them as support to reach the end of the dungeon and didn't care if they died in the process. Cole could only glare at him as it was like Yang in his past, taking all the blames, and doing all the work. Some people never change.

The group finally trekked into a large clearing in the dungeon to have Cole become on high alert. Normally a large clearing in a dungeon could mean many things. One that Cole was more worried about was it could spawn in a high leveled dungeon boss or a horde of monsters to fend off. Either or, the raven haired teen didn't want to take chances in case anything happened. Besides being a guide through the dungeon, his goal now was to also make sure the Midnight Knights got out alive as well. Even if it cost him his own life in the game. Yang wasn't going to get away with killing innocent players if he was being unruly in the game.

"Hey Cole," Dust spoke up. He turned to the ex-second-in-command as he walked up to him and gazed around the large clearing. The raven haired teen could tell he was being vigilant of the area to be alert. "What do you think this could be of? I don't like the looks of it."

Cole nodded. "Yeah. You and me both."

"What's the hold up, guide!?" one of Yang's member shouted. "There's no time for breaks."

His amber eyes glared at the player as he wasn't taking a break or anything. Clearly this player doesn't venture in dungeons much to know what was truly inside. Something to keep note of. "We're thinking okay!" he retorted back. "A large clearing like this could spell disaster if you're not careful. Surely I thought someone like you would know that already."

The player snarled deeply to slowly reach for his sword, ready to kill Cole. But a hand grabbed his wrist to see Yang glare at him and refrained himself from commiting his act. The snow haired player released his grip and turned to Cole. "Well hurry up and do what it is you're doing. We should be close to this item and we won't deal with you anymore once we're done here."

Cole snorted to look away and studied the area more. As he suspected, large clearing, no signs of traps or anything; doesn't mean they should let their guard down. And before they entered the clearing, there were two paths to choose from. And debating on the path, he chose this one to be here and should retreat back before the game spawned in something. "Let's move back," he suggested. "We shouldn't be here, more likely a room to spawn in a boss or horde."

"Why should we?" Yang interjected. "You guys are capable of fighting these things. Just let it attack you and we'll continue after this."

"But we don't know what this thing could be and if we die here, you're up next and are less likely able to fight it since all you do is stand and watch like in IRL, Yang. Face it, you're a coward. And everyone here knows it."

His eyes glared at the raven haired teen to have him glare back at him. He had to bring up their past about IRL in front of everyone, he almost had it with him. He should've killed his avatar character when he had the chance. "Now listen here you little bas-." He took a step in the clearing, but stopped as the ground shook to have everyone alerted.

Cole and the captured guild glanced around while maintaining their balance as the ground shook violently. Chunks of rock fell from the ceiling to have Yang and his guild step back to the corridor. The small earthquake eased as a large crack had formed in the ground to have Dust catiously make his way over to it and glance in. "Dust, be careful." Cole warned him. "This could be another trap." He watched him nod and heard the sound of stone falling to glance over his shoulder to watch as a blockade of stones fell at the exit of the corridor. He heard Yang shout in anger as the sealed exit separated him from Cole and the guild. "Good, they'll have to take the other way."

"Cole, we got a problem!" Dust shouted.

The raven haired teen turned his attention to the tremor in the ground to hear clatters of metal and bones coming from inside to draw out his double bladed axe while the Midnight Knights drew their weapons out. Hordes of skeletons in armor crawled out of the crack to charge towards the players to have the players stand their ground as they were surrounded. Cole parried a sword from a skeleton to quickly attacked its leg to have it shatter into pieces as he killed it and watched as the guild were working together fend off the horde and continued to fight.

The last of the horde was finished off as Mac struck his sword through the breastplate of the skeleton and glanced around to snort. "That was just easy." he said to sheathe his sword. "Not much of a challenge. Come on game, let us out of this area and get that treasure before they do. Seriously I can-"

"Shh!" Cole hushed him to raise his hand and listened carefully. The guild was quiet to listen with him and could hear something large climbing from the crack. A large bony hand grabbed the ledge, along with a second, third, and fourth hand to have a large skeleton climb out. Cole and the guild stepped back to stare at awe of the large bulky skeleton with a hunched spine and four arms. A boss of the dungeon to roar at the guild to draw out his four swords from their scabbarbs with two HP bars appearing below its name; _Samukai- King of the Underworld_.

A lump formed in Cole's throat as the guild stood rigid to the boss before them and gripped his axe tightly. Samukai eyed the players to charge at them and swung his arms to attack them. Cole dodged the first sword from hitting him and quickly strafed to avoid another blade from swiping at him. He saw a third blade coming for him to brace himself for the blow, but Dust quickly stood in front of him to parry the attack and grabbed his arm to pull him away. "Thanks." he sighed a bit. "This thing is quick, and has four arms to give us a disadvantage to fight against. We need to think of a plan."

Dust nodded. "I'm thinking we need to get it from behind, but have to work together as well.

"Thing fights well with four arms, like a guild together."

"And we'll fight well with a guild as well."

Cole and Dust nod to each other to charge toward the boss and to aid the guild. A large sword was coming for the raven haired teen to charge the blade of his axe a black aura and parried the large blade and grabbed Mac to his feet. "You, Dust, and I focus on deflecting the swords." he commanded. "The rest of you attack its legs and any openings we make. Now move it!"

Mac nodded to the plan to grip his shield tightly to watch the boss lunge a sword toward him and raised it to catch the blade and struggled against the force. But he held on as the skeleton pushed against him until he heard someone running behind him and lept off his shoulder. A charged rapier sword struck at the bosses wrist to have it howl in pain to have the player spun on his knees and struck at its legs to make Mac cheer in joy. "Atta boy, Jace!" he shouted to the red haired teen. He saw him nod, but noticed a leg was about to strike him from behind to rush over to him and held his shield up to parry the kick. "Get it to kick you again, I think we can cause it to trip back down the crack."

"Got it!" Jace agreed and ran around to strike at its legs back and forth.

"Cole, you heard that right!?" Mac shouted. "Keep pushing it back to fall back into the ground."

Cole looked at the blonde haired teen to glance at the crack and saw where he was going with on this plan to nod and parried another blade with Dust's help and two players with maces struck at its chest. Samukai roared loudly to the swarming players around it to step around and swing hazardly to have Cole, Dust, and Mac deflect the attacks to let Jace and the other three players attack any open spaces created for them. Its health was depleting to the teamwork they were pulling together. Cole was impressed a bit, they may have a chance of being this without Mac's plan.

But the determination of victory was crushed when the raven haired teen saw a kick heading for him. His eyes widen as he watched the skeleton kicked his foot down on the ground and delivered a powerful round house kick to him across the clearing and crash against the wall. A groan escaped from his lips to watch part of his HP drain a bit and tried to pull himself to his feet to breath heavily. Even with him far from the others, he watched at the guild push the boss back closer and closer to the crack in the floor. Finally, Mac's shield glowed a bright red aura as he charged it and thrust the metal at the skeleton's leg to stammer back and cause it to balance and fall down into the crack.

The guild cheered in victory, but it was cut short as a bony hand reached out to grab the ledge and struggled to pull itself up. Samukai may have fallen into the crack, the four arms had grabbed onto the walls to stabalize itself and was climbing back up. Worried, Cole knew the guild was going to become exhausted if it kept fighting them. If they become exhausted to overwork their brains, the boss would take the advantage and kill their avatars and they'll join the Overlord's army. He glanced above the crack to see stalagtites on the roof above Samukai to see a plan form and glanced at his axe to nod as it was a dangerous plan. Taking a deep breath, he jumped to his feet to rush to the guild with his weapon glowing a black aura. "Get back!" he commanded. "Mac, shield!"

The guild heard the teen shout as he rushed toward them and glanced at the roof to see the stalagtites to rush back. Mac held his shield over his head to prepare himself and pushed hard as he felt Cole's weight on it to launch him high and rushed out of the way. Eyeing the target, Cole twisted his body to throw his axe and struck at the hanging stones to land back on the ground. The roof began to crack and crumble to the powerful shock from the thrown weapon to cause the pointed stones to fall, crush and impale the skeleton boss and filled the crack in the procress. Cole was breathing heavily to the silence as they saw a bright flash of light to signify the defeat of an enemy and a message appeared in front of him; congratulating him for the defeat of a boss with experience points, gold, revived HP, and a bonus prize of equipment to the one who killed it. The guild cheered a real victory, patting Cole on the back for the final blow and they could leave.

Another tremor of the ground surprised the guild of teens to watch the exit open back up after the defeat of the boss. The way out finally, to leave the dungeon, and hopefully Yang and his sadistic guild. Cole pulled himself to his feet, sheathing his axe, but paused as he realized he didn't have it in his hand. He glanced at the pile of rubble to realize he must've lost it in the cave in and was probably long gone at that point. He shrugged it away to lead the way through the exit. "Let's keep moving," he said. "The sooner we move, the better we can get away from Yang." The guild glanced at him as he lead the way and followed closely behind.

They tranversed down the rocky corridor for ten minutes until they spotted light at the end of the tunnel and quickly rushed toward it. Their eyes widen to the large clearing that was filled with weapons, treasure, and in the very back of the clearing was a large scythe embedded into a decorated rock. This was it, the end of the dungeon and the quest of Yang's; the treasure room. And Cole had a suspicion that the scythe was the quest item his old rival needed.

Before the seven teens took a step into the room, another rumble of stone moved at another corridor to reveal Yang and his guild. The Midnight Knights and Cole were frozen to see them on the other side as well Yang and his guild was. Both parties had one hope that the other party had either fallen to the beasts or traps of the dungeon. Now both were back when they got separated, a race for the quest item now stood before them. Who would get to it first?


	19. The Scythe of Quakes

**Chapter 5: The Scythe of Quakes**

All were frozen to move. Both guild parties stood across from each other. Both hoping that the other wouldn't make it far in the dungeon. Now both stood in the treasure room, where the quest item for Yang stood in the very center of it all. And both Cole and Yang glared at each other, know that virtual bloodshed was going to be spilled as it was a race now to receive the item. A scythe embedded into stone.

Cole glanced at the weapon in stone to Yang with the other Midnight Knights to nod to them. Without any hesitation, Cole started to run with the others. Yang saw what was happening to start pursuing the same. "Don't let them get the scythe!" he barked orders to his guild.

Yang's guild had their weapons drawn out to charge to Cole and the guild and the Midnight Knight's drawn their weapons out to clash in the middle of the treasure room. Metal clashed against one another followed by the sound of charged energy to focus on powerful attacks to either inflict damage to a player or stun them. Cole, being weaponless after the fight with the boss, dodged the sword from one of Yang's members until Jace came to his aid to fight off the assailant. The raven haired teen nodded to his defense and glanced from the cluster of players to see Yang slip from the fight as he was rushing to the scythe and quickly gave chase. For being able to slip past the groups, Yang had a headstart to the scythe, but with Cole sprinting, he knew both were going to reach the scythe together.

Both teens grabbed a hold of the scythe to glare at each other until Yang grabbed his sword to lash out at Cole to have him dodge the blade at close range. But when being distracted, it gave Yang the chance to send a kick to his abdomen to hear him gasp and lost his grip on the scythe and felt a powerful kick to land on his back. Finally the only one grabbing hold of the weapon, Yang pulled the scythe out of the stone to have the scythe glow in his hands. A smile of victory played on his lips to gaze at the gasping teen as he pulled himself to his knees. Cole felt lost that he didn't make it on time.

"Always trying to be the hero, a protector from the bullies in school." Yang snickered. "Yet you weren't strong enough to defend yourself. Falling into my hands, doing what I say. Both IRL and in this game. Pathetic, Cole Brookestone." He moved away from the stone to see his guild had disarmed the Midnight Knights and recaptured them. "Even when standing up against me, you still failed. I may have been expelled, but it doesn't stop me from who I am. What do you have to say?"

Cole was frozen to speak as he looked at the captured guild in fear. They were trapped again, facing death to become part of the Overlord's army. A promise he made to the guild to get them away from Yang's and yet they were cornered and Yang had the item. Dust struggled against the headlock of a burly Yang member to gasp as he felt his neck being squeezed by the arm. "Don't listen to him, Cole!" he shouted. "You done everything for us to get this far. He's nothing like you. He's noth-" His rant was cut short as the player holding him squeezed him harder.

Cole stuttered. "I-I..."

The white haired player snort to nod to his member and waved his hand. Dust was pushed to the floor and soon was getting beaten by the player to have bits of his HP drained from each blow and kick. Cole listened to raven haired teen's screams of pain as he tried to defend the attacks, but each scream made his virtual heart stammer in pain. The times he saw Yang being the higher up in school to attack the younger students was the reason why he stood against him to begin with. But seeing this scene of having his follower attack the innocent, made him glare at Yang. _Not again._ he thought to himself. "Enough!"

The shout brought the white haired player's attention to turn to Cole to give him a sly smirk. Highschool all over again, he mused himself to it. The raven haired glanced at the gloves he wore to have them glow a bright orange as he clenched his fist to channel his energy. And with quick speed, that caught everyone off by surprise, Cole was soon in front of the player and unleashed a powerful punch to his face to have him fly across the treasure room to have Yang's guild stood rigid. Even Yang's jaw dropped a bit to the power he had.

Cole pulled Dust to his feet to glare at Yang to have his gloves glow again; threating him. "Enough from you, Yang." he growled. "No more from you. Many players may have died from your hands, but no more. No more players will not die by your hands! You won't kill these guys, I won't allow it! If you want to fight, fight me! I will fight for their freedom!"

It was quiet to hear anything from the white haired player. He kept glancing at the body of his fallen member to know the power he had as a player. But this power wasn't going to scare him to listen to him. He had the scythe, he was powerful now. He wasn't going to listen to the ranting teen. "If you won't just submit to my order, then you will die." he said as he took another step away from the resting spot of the scythe. "And once I'm done killing you, I'll finish these pesky players as well. No one stands up against me like this. You've done it before, but I won't let it happen again! I am the ruler of this game! I'm the strongest here! I'm-"

His voice was cut off as the ground shook to cause everyone to stumble a bit. Cole and Yang turned to the resting spot of the scythe to see the stone move and crack down the middle to see sharp teeth inside. The ground around the stone broke free as large scaly legs broke the surface with a large set of wings and a thick tail. A large, stone covered dragon climbed out of the ground to roar loudly at the players to have everyone step back slowly. The dragon's eyes studied the players and its large eyes spotted the scythe in Yang's hands to grumble deeply in its throat and lunged for the player.

Taking action for an unknown reason, Cole tackled Yang to help him avoid the dragon attack, but it caused the scythe to slip from his hands and slid across the room. Both players watched the scythe across the room to see the dragon reach toward it and grabbed hold of it with its mouth. With its secured, the dragon turned to the wall and used its thick tail to destroy the wall to reveal the rising sun of the mountains to climb out and spread its wings. Knowing it was going to take flight and take the scythe away, both Cole and Yang sprang to their feet to rush toward the beast. To get better advantage Yang grabbed handful of gold coins to throw them at Cole's face to stutter him a bit and slow him down. But the raven haired teen shook it away to keep sprinting harder, grabbing an axe along the way. The dragon took flight as the teens reached the hole it made to jump after it, Yang grabbing onto its foot and Cole on the tail.

The final confrontation for the scythe stood on the back of a flying dragon.


	20. Finally Over

**Hey everyone, I know I've been away for some time, been busy alot with school and work that I don't have much free time for writing and posting. But I'm doing everything I can to keep this story alive.**

* * *

 **Chapter 6: Finally Over**

The wind howled past Cole's ears as he held on tightly to the tail of a stone covered dragon. While ahead of him was Yang as it held onto the back foot of the dragon in the same predicament. Apparently the skeleton king they fought earlier was one of many bosses in the dungeon. Now the dragon was the guardian of the scythe that Yang removed, it caused the dragon to take the scythe back and take flight. Hence why Cole and Yang were on the dragon, holding tightly in fear of falling into the mountains below them.

The bangs of Cole's raven hair brushed into his eyes as the wind whipped them and kept his head down to avoid the strong breeze. But he glanced up a bit to see Yang climbing on the dragon's foot to head for its back to realize he was climbing for the scythe from its mouth. Not wanting to let him win, Cole began to slowly climb his way to the back as well, thankful the crevices of stone embedded on its body allowed him to grab on and pull himself to the back. He finally reached the base of the tail to carefully get on his feet, being careful on his balance as he watched Yang slowly walk across its back. This was the time to finally stop him. "Yang!" he shouted to the teen. "You and I need to finish this once and for all."

The shout caused the white haired player to stop in his tracks and glanced over his shoulder. He stood rigid to see the raven haired teen behind him to turn back and sprint for the scythe in the dragon's mouth. Cole took off after him with the axe in hand. When the two were at the wings of the dragon, Yang quickly drew out his sword to spin on his heels and swung for Cole's neck. But the axehead caught the blade to have Cole swung a punch to his jaw to push him back and gripped the weapon tightly with both hands. Both were breathing heavily as they circled around each other on the back of the dragon while maintaining their balance.

The bangs on Cole's hair whipped past his eyes as he glared at his old highschool rival as the weapon of the axe rolled in his hands. Yang returned the affection to grip his sword tightly, being mindful of his balance on the dragon and strong gust of wind. Finally, the white haired player shouted as he ran toward Cole and swung his sword to have it parried and quickly recovered to swing at him. But the staff of the axe caught the blade as Cole pushed against his strength until he thrust the pummel of the handle at his foot to yelp in pain and swung the axe to his chest. A long gash formed on Yang's chest to have polygonal red pieces bleed from it to have him breath heavily as some of his HP was lost with a bleeding effect appear on his bar. His anger was blinding him on how to fight to lose some of his HP, he just didn't know it.

"Your anger is getting the better of you, Yang." Cole stated. "It was what made you the strong one in IRL, but even then you had a downfall. And this will be your downfall again.

Downfall? That word angered Yang more. Cole was the reason why he had the downfall in IRL, all because he snitched on him. He longed for the revenge, even if he could get it in the game. He didn't care for the weapon anymore, he just wanted to kill him. "I just want you dead!" he shouted. "Downfall or not. I want to kill you so I don't have to deal with you in this game anymore." He charged his sword to a bright white aura and charged to the raven haired to jump and twist his body as he swung the blade.

In quick retaliation, Cole charged the axehead a black aura and swung upward to catch the blade of the sword. A powerful force brushed past both teens as they pushed against each other, but the blast caught the dragon to fly haphazardly a bit to have them stumble on their balance. Yang saw the chance to swing a low kick at Cole's unbalanced legs to have him fall unto his back with his axe out of his hands. The axe slid across the dragon's back until it got caught in a stone crevice near the left wing. Cole propped himself to his elbows, but the tip of Yang's sword was underneath his chin to gulp a little as he saw the crazed look on his face.

A large grin was plastered on his face as he was breathing heavily. It was what he finally wanted. His rival cornered, weaponless, fear brandishing in his amber eyes. "I've finally got you, Cole." he said, hysteric. "You're nothing now. With no weapon, you can't defend yourself. Now you can die knowing that I won for good."

He had to think on his options now. Yang had his sword at his throat, yes. Axe out of his grip, yes as well. Yang winning this battle and killing him and the captured guild he had, no. He would not see that happening ever. He dealt with him in the past, he couldn't let Yang win again like he done in the past when he joined at the guild. His amber eyes traced toward the axe by the wing and the rocky scale his hand was gripped to back towards the crazed teen.

The sword had moved from his chin as Yang held it high to deliver the final blow as he brought it down to his neck. Taking control of his avatar body, his brain commanded him to roll away while wrenching a scale off the dragon's back and used it as a blunt weapon to strike the back of Yang's knee. The white haired teen screamed in pain to fall to his knees and Cole used the stone again to struck him in the head to stun him and run for the axe. He reached the fallen weapon to grip tightly with both to charge the blade with a golden aura and sliced through the dragon's wing to cut it off its back. The dragon roared loudly in pain and started falling towards the ground and Cole and Yang felt gravity take hold as they were rocked off the dragon's back.

The air was howling past his ears as he was falling towards the ground and Cole flipped his body to stabilize his body. In hindsight, he should've thought about it more. But it was the only option to stop Yang from killing him and even getting the scythe from the dragon. In his fall, he saw the scythe falling near him and saw Yang skydiving for it to bring his arms close to his side and dive for it as well. His acceleration increased as he was near for the weapon, while heading for the ground faster to reach for it as Yang did as well. Cole's hand was the first to grab the scythe to flip his body and used the handle of the weapon to strike Yang in the jaw to push him back and flipped his body again as they were close to the sides of the mountain.

The curved blade of the scythe glowed a bright black aura and swung it to dig into the mountain side. He felt his free-falling come to an end as he dragged the scythe down to create a long crack down the side until he was hanging onto the handle. His heart was racing to the height of impending death and saw Yang was still falling and quickly grabbed his arm to catch him. But the sudden weight dragged him down to grip onto the pummel of the weapon. Both were hanging now to certain death, Cole's arms were screaming in pain to the weight of Yang and being stretched to keep them both alive.

Yang glared at the raven haired teen as he hung over the mountain side that would lead him to his death. Yet he was still alive even after that fall, Cole could let him fall still and not catch him. "You should've let me die!" he shouted. "You have the scythe, you won."

The pain continued to spread in his body to the weight of the player to grunt as he tried to pull them up. But no effort was made as he remained at the end of the scythe handle. Both would die regardless in their situation. "I kept you alive because I wanted to." he grunted. "You may have been trying to kill me in this game and all. But I still give you the chance to live in this game. Because I know who you are, Yang. Yet I still let you live."

A small smile formed on the snow white haired teen's face to his words to chuckle a little. Cole had to glare at his laugh. Now wasn't a time for a joke. "Always knew what was best to not only yourself, but to those around you" he said, letting go of his hand. Cole grunted as Yang released his grip on him; starting to lose his grip on him. "But I guess you can't save everyone in this game. Not even me. Truth be told, I wanted to get you back for everything, dating my sister, getting me expelled, just standing up against me. But yet, I realized that it was foolish now. All of this for revenge."

Cole gripped Yang's wrist tightly as he could feel him slipping from his hand. It doesn't have to end this way for him. "Yang, take my hand!" he demanded. "I forgive you for tricking me to being your guide and nearly trying to kill me in this game. But we can put our differences aside if you just take my hand."

"Why bother? You did everything to beat me. To that, I yield this battle for good. Keep the scythe, you've earned it. Tell those Midnight Knights they're free from my guild's control. Good luck on beating this game, Cole." He squirmed his hand free and began to fall from the raven haired teen.

"Yang!" Cole shouted as he watched the teen fall into the abyss of the mountain below him. He hung there shocked to what he saw him do before his eyes. Giving up on his avatar life so he could live on. Cole was going to do something to keep them both alive and yet Yang allowed him to live on instead of them both. Taking a deep breath, Cole turned his attention to keeping himself from Yang's fate to grip the scythe and swung to catch the mountain. He freed the scythe from the mountain and slowly began to make his climb back up.

* * *

Time had really passed for the raven haired teen, but he eventually made his way back to the hole in the mountain that the dragon made when it escaped with the two of them. As he finally climbed the ledge to pull himself up, Cole saw that Midnight Knights had disarmed Yang's old guild and have been waiting for one of them to returned. When all guild members turned to Cole, Yang's guild were in a state of shock to see the teen had returned with the scythe sheathed to his back. Dust and the other knights were thrilled to see him alive after he left with Yang on the dragon. Cole had come back and had the scythe in hand for his victory.

Cole glared at Yang's guild to draw out the scythe as he walked over to them and had the blade under one of their chins. The guild member was frozen in fear to gulp as they weren't in a safe zone and he could kill them in one swipe with that blade. But Cole, being merciful after witnessing Yang's death, removed the blade and nudged his head to the side. "Leave, never come back and bothering them." he demanded to see them nod and ran off. He turned to Dust and the other knights to smile at them sympathetically. "Let's get you out of here and to the next town."


End file.
